Dirk von Lowtzow

After dropping out of art history studies, Dirk von Lowtzow landed in Hamburg in 1993 and saw for the first time at the Hamburger Kunstverein what was then 
as now called "contemporary art" and did not exist in Freiburg. The 
exhibition was called "Backstage" ("I only knew it from punk clubs") and was intended as 
a peek behind the scenes and at the same time as an overview of "institutional critique" and 
"contextual art". Many of the positions shown corresponded with the practice of Tocotronic, which had just 
begun. 
Five years later, he met Isabelle Graw, author and editor of "Texte 
zur Kunst" in Cologne and was hired as an art critic for the magazine after a bar evening. 
This volume of essays brings together (almost) all the articles that Dirk von Lowtzow wrote for "Texte zur Kunst" and for catalogs in the years 
1999-2019 - in chronological order. 
It begins with a visit to Sigmar Polke's exhibition at the Hamburger Kunsthalle 
and ends with some (unanswered) questions to the writer Leïla 
Slimani. There will also be a mini-drama   
Dirk von Lowtzow will create an entertaining and sometimes very funny evening with old 
and new texts about art and sing the matching songs from three 
decades of Tocotronic.  
"Detektive" will be published by Verbrecher Verlag in August 2026. 

Dirk von Lowtzow, born in Offenburg/Baden in 1971, founded the 
rock band Tocotronic together with Arne Zank and Jan Müller in Hamburg in 1993. Since 1995 
many Tocotronic albums have been released, most recently the album "Golden Years" in 2025