Groundhoppers

• Michaela Zimmer, Jirka Pfahl, DAG, Erika Krause, Grapebattleships
• 25th September - 6th November                   Platform A Gallery
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• Annie O'Donnell, Matthew Kaplan, Tony Charles, Nick Kennedy, John James Perangie, Will Hughes                                      19th March - 29th March                                  GLUE Berlin

In March of 2025, Platform A collaborated with Berlin based gallery Glue to facilitate a ten-day long artist residency in Berlin. Artists Tony Charles, Nick Kennedy, John James Perangie, Annie O’Donnell (in collaboration with American photographer Matthew Kaplan), and Will Hughes were invited to immerse themselves in the Berlin art scene and create new work responding to their findings. This residency culminated in an exhibition hosted by Glue. Titled Groundhoppers, the exhibition presented each artists response to their surroundings with work made on site at the gallery. The exhibition preview presented a clear natural connection between the environments of the Tees Valley and East Germany. In an industrial context, but connections were also formed with grassroots arts organisations and LGBTQIA+ culture. The immersive nature of the residency fostered the forming of international networks for each artist with the curators and artists circulating Berlin and vice versa. Platform A’s artists were additionally invited to exhibit in the Kunstraum Ortloff gallery in Leipzig and have since shown in the Berggut Oschartz Project Space, expanding their newly formed networks out of Berlin and into the wider German art scene.

Now, Platform A invites artist and Glue director DAG, who helped facilitate the original residency, to bring a show featuring a selection of artists to participate in Middlesbrough Art Week. This second edition of Groundhoppers presents works by DAG, Jirka Pfahl, Michaela Zimmer, Erika Krause, and Grapebattleships, in an exhibition that promises an investigation into the creative and cultural similarities between Middlesbrough and Berlin. The continued relationship between Platform A and Glue demonstrates the benefits of augmenting creative networks on an international level.