Niclas Riepshoff
Gänsehaut
14.09. - 31.10.2025

The rehearsal room is a space of preparation before a performance. It can be a site of
experimentation, where one feels unobserved before stepping onto the stage. A place for
repetition, for taking run-ups, and practising alone again and again It is the inside before the
outside.

The project space klix was formerly a rehearsal basement. This backstory forms the foundation of
Gänsehaut by Niclas Riepshoff. Together with the initiators, he draws on elements of the rehearsal
space and translates them into the exhibition. Here, the participants act like members of a band—
questions of roles, organization, and decision-making processes are transferred into this
structure.

A central element of the exhibition is an electronic drum set. It produces two acoustic layers: the
muffled sound of beats on rubber, and a digital track audible only through headphones. These
levels are spatially separated in the exhibition. The digitally generated sound fills the main room,
while the rubber sound is contained within a small chamber that was formerly used as a recording
studio.

Egg cartons, often used for soundproofing in recording studios, are transformed into a wall
installation that forms an infinite grid. Eggs are placed in their individual compartments. Some are
painted, while others are decorated with collages in homage to musicians such as Freddie
Mercury, SOPHIE, Klaus Nomi, Tracy Chapman and Boy George.

The egg formations follow the rules of the Game of Life, developed by mathematician John
Conway in 1970. This game, based on cellular automata, imagines an endless grid of identical
cells. Each cell is either alive (filled) or dead (empty), and its state is determined by the number of
neighboring cells. These rules generate complex visual patterns that Conway himself termed 'still
lifes' (e.g., pond, beehive, boat), as well as oscillating shapes and 'gliders' that traverse the grid. If
all cells die, only 'empty worlds' are left.

The egg, culturally and art-historically associated with origin, fragility, or the beginning of life, is
reinterpreted here. It appears as a pixel within an algorithmic structure and simultaneously
references visual worlds from pop and music history. Gänsehaut connects the material past of the
rehearsal space with questions of reproduction, the distribution of roles and physicality. Like
goosebumps, viewed up close and caused by activation of the nervous system.
A brief shiver when music moves you, or just before stepping onto the stage.

Leonie Schmiese