Anti-bourgeois, anarchist, and pacifist, Dada, with its sharp eye and biting satire, offered social criticism, questioning prevailing values ​​as well as political and social conditions and dynamics, especially those that had led to the catastrophe of the First World War. To mark its 110th anniversary, “Unlock your heads at last!” celebrates the Dada art movement and demonstrates the continued relevance of its political engagement.

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In the summer of 2025, Ukrainian photo artist Hanna Melnykova emigrated from Germany to Ukraine and documented her “performative walk” photographically. The exhibition shows her engagement with migration, resilience, and cultural ties in the current geopolitical landscape. The symbolic meaning of this walk: It represents life itself. The route set for the project illustrates the borders between nations and embodies the gap between past and future as well as personal and collective transformation.

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The exhibition explores the fractured biographies of two men: the Expressionist painter and graphic artist Fritz Schaefler (1888-1954) and the Rheinland Jewish industrialist and art collector Joseph Heymann (1887-1954). It recounts their shared interests and common ground, such as their love for the city of Cologne, Carnival, and their connection to the Bergisches Land region, and traces, through letters and documents, the fate of the Heymann art collection until its return to Germany.