Langen Foundation, Neuss, Germany
Lachen ist verdächtig (Laughing Is Suspicious)
18.01.2026 – 15.03.2026

We are deeply aware of the significance of Fabian Knecht’s intervention at the Langen Foundation, where the iconic Tadao Ando building is transformed through the installation of multiple camouflage nets woven from clothing and everyday textiles by Ukrainian civilians. Lachen ist verdächtig (2022–) introduces a largely unseen dimension of Ukrainian civilian resistance into the context of the Langen Foundation. Since the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, hand-knotted camouflage nets have emerged as one of the most widespread forms of civilian resistance in Ukraine. While they are rarely visible in international media—precisely because they serve to conceal critical infrastructure—their presence is deeply familiar across the country.

The nets are usually produced by women and children who gather in communal settings, to contribute to protection against Russian violence. Often woven from donated clothing rather than tactical materials, the resulting camouflage is improvised and heterogeneous. Knecht collected the nets during 19 humanitarian missions to Ukraine since the start of the war, exchanging them on site for professional military-grade camouflage. Sourced from nearly all regions of the country, the nets vary widely in color, density, pattern, structure, and materiality. Installed together, they form a dense spatial and visual field that speaks to care, vulnerability, resilience, and the blurred boundary between civilian life and warfare.

The work foregrounds acts of quiet, collective resistance—the often invisible labor of ordinary citizens in wartime. Each net bears the traces of the hands that made it and the community it sought to protect. The installation challenges audiences outside Ukraine to consider the forms resistance can take in times of war.

During the Cold War, the missile station on the site of what is now the Langen Foundation was itself covered with camouflage nets—a historical resonance that deepens the significance of Knecht’s installation. The presentation is complemented by Land (2022), a sound work by Ukrainian artist Ihor Okuniev, previously shown at Haus der Kunst in Munich and the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. The twenty-minute soundscape explores the acoustic dimension of a landscape shaped by war.

Curated by Nadim Samman.