Haverkampf Leistenschneider

About the Gallery
Haverkampf Leistenschneider is a contemporary art gallery founded in 2017 by Philipp Haverkampf and Carolin Leistenschneider. Since then, the gallery has established a dynamic, cross-generational programme featuring young, local artists such as Anna Grath, Okka-Esther Hungerbühler, Maximilian Kirmse and Fabian Treiber, as well as bringing more established, international positions such as US painters Katherine Bradford, Lois Dodd, EJ Hauser and Aubrey Levinthal to European audiences. 
 
With a strong affinity for contemporary painting and those who test its boundaries, the programme also represents artists working across drawing, collage, sculpture and installation. In close collaboration with these artists, the gallery seeks to support the development of new projects, foster institutional links and provide a platform for discussion and inspiration between artists and audiences. The exhibition space is complemented by video tours and live talks, while the online series SPOT ON offers closely curated insights into the work of a single artist at regular intervals.
 
The gallery also participates in national and international art fairs and, since 2020, has been dedicated to producing artist publications and exhibition catalogues with commissioned essays by acclaimed art writers. 
 
Deeply committed to environmental sustainability, Galerie Haverkampf Leistenschneider has been a member of the GALLERY CLIMATE COALITION since 2020 and is one of the co-founders of GCC Berlin e.V. The GCC provides members with critical insights and tools to promote zero-waste practices, aiming to reduce the visual arts sector’s greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% by 2030. 

About the Presentation
Haverkampf Leistenschneider will debut at Independent with a duo presentation featuring work by Maximilian Kirmse & Aubrey Levinthal.

In her paintings, Aubrey Levinthal bears witness to everyday life in an almost meticulous manner. Inherent to her self-portraits, as well as images of friends, family, and ephemeral moments she picks up in her neighborhood, is a slow and diffuse sense of time. Her works use a palette of light greens, yellows, ochres, pastels, as well as darker colors, and their perspectives are often dislocated, evincing an air of melancholy and emotional imbalance. Her paintings oscillate between beauty and disillusionment, addressing loneliness as an accompanying phenomenon of our life in late capitalism, which is oriented towards performance and efficiency.

Maximilian Kirmse’s works blend nostalgic charm with a warm, personal affection for his native Berlin. Rather than grand cityscapes, his scenes focus on the simplicity of everyday life – the 'event' of the work may be nothing more than a car stuck in traffic, a crowd crossing the street, the subway, or the soft glow of a late-night cigarette. With techniques ranging from quick pencil sketches to luminous airbrushed visions to fuzzy daubs of paint reminiscent of the Impressionists, Kirmse's style effortlessly combines elements of "high" and "low" culture, making room for both cartoonish parody and a heartfelt, attentive sincerity towards his subject.