Oscar Murillo Turns Potsdam Into A Living Canvas

There is a particular kind of distance that most exhibitions rely on. You walk in, you look, you leave. The work remains intact, untouched, protected by both space and expectation. At DAS MINSK Kunsthaus, that distance has been removed entirely.

With Collective Osmosis, Oscar Murillo reshapes the idea of what an exhibition can hold. This is not a presentation of finished works. It is a space that continues to change, shaped by the people who move through it rather than defined before they arrive.

The centre of the exhibition is not inside the gallery in the traditional sense. It unfolds on the terrace, where a large scale painting exists in a constant state of becoming. From April through August, visitors are invited to take part in its creation. Brushes and paint are made available, but there is no instruction guiding the outcome. The work builds through accumulation, not direction, and the result resists any fixed composition.

Murillo has spent years working within this territory, where participation is not treated as an addition but as material in itself. His earlier projects at Tate Modern and the São Paulo Biennale established a language that moves beyond the idea of authorship as something singular. In Potsdam, that language becomes more expansive, shaped by time, repetition, and the presence of different hands contributing without hierarchy.

What sits beneath the surface of this evolving work is equally significant. The base of the terrace painting is formed through Murillo’s ongoing project known as Social mapping. Since 2024, he has invited communities across different cities to take part in open drawing sessions, creating marks that reflect their own environments, rhythms, and interactions. These sessions have taken place in public spaces rather than controlled settings, allowing the work to emerge from everyday movement rather than curated participation.

Across Germany, institutions and community spaces have contributed to this process, sending completed canvases back to DAS MINSK. Each one carries its own visual language, shaped by the people who engaged with it and the context in which it was made. When brought together, they form a layered foundation that is both fragmented and connected, turning the museum into a point of exchange rather than a site of conclusion.

The opening on April 25 sets the tone without forcing structure onto it. Curators Anna Schneider and Daniel Milnes are joined by Brazilian curator Raphael Fonseca, who places Murillo’s work within a broader lineage of public and participatory practices rooted in Latin American art history. The atmosphere remains open, with conversation unfolding alongside a shared meal rather than being confined to a formal setting.

At the centre of this gathering sits Brenda, an oven sculpture by Gabriel Chaile, which is lit for the first time during the opening. Its presence shifts the focus toward something more elemental. Fire, food, and collective presence become part of the work, grounding the exhibition in forms of connection that exist beyond the institutional frame.

The wider programme extends these ideas without attempting to define them. A guided tour in May introduces perspectives from Amanda Carneiro of the Museu de Arte de São Paulo, offering a reading of Murillo’s practice through a South American context. In June, Murillo enters into conversation with Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung, whose work continues to shape critical discourse across international institutions. These moments provide entry points into the thinking behind the exhibition, but they do not attempt to fix its meaning.

What remains consistent throughout Collective Osmosis is a refusal to settle. The work does not resolve into a finished state, and it does not ask to be understood in a single viewing. Instead, it holds space for something slower and less predictable, where meaning develops through interaction rather than explanation.

In Potsdam, Murillo is not presenting an outcome. He is building a condition, one that continues to shift as long as people are willing to take part in it.