“So Far So Good” – This is the title of the solo exhibition of the world-renowned illustrator and comic artist Anna Haifisch (b. 1986), on view at the MK&G from 6 June to 20 October 2024. With around 300 works, the show provides a comprehensive look at Haifisch’s diverse oeuvre, from illustrations and prints to comics and drawings as well as products adorned with her designs. The juxtaposition of fine and applied art sheds light on the artist’s working process while recent pieces such as the “Ready America” series are also on view, together with a work produced expressly for the exhibition.

Haifisch’s designs are distinguished by an interplay of expressive colouration and fragile line. Her stories elicit humour from a virtuoso use of pop culture set pieces. Haifisch sees herself as following in the international tradition of so-called Funny Animals such as Snoopy from Charles M. Schulz’s “Peanuts” and the cartoon series “Looney Tunes”, from which she draws inspiration. In her drawings, anthropomorphic, seemingly anodyne animal figures serve as allegories for the absurdities of daily life. But their superficial silliness sometimes gives way to a dark melancholy. The artist plays with visual and narrative codes from the design world, comics, and art history to create her very own artistic language.

The exhibition has been made possible with funds from the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg and the Rudolf Augstein Foundation.