Art instead of crosses: How Manifesta aims to revitalize churches. They boast, "This is not a Church" and stage a Queer Upper Silesian Last Supper

Crazy displacement activities following loss of Faith Art as a revitalization measure for unused church spaces – under this motto, the Manifesta art exhibition is making a stop in the Ruhr region this summer. The fact that church services were held here until a few years ago fades into the background under a huge garbage-bag-blue plastic tarp. The Spanish-Brazilian artist collective Penique Productions has lined the interior of St. Joseph's Church in Gelsenkirchen with a large inflatable membrane. Like a second skin, it stretches over the altar, the walls, and between the columns. The church windows still shimmer through. Plastic sheeting, sand, a grandstand made of pews In the nave, which the artists now call an airship, designer Curro Claret has repurposed discarded pews into picnic tables and stacked them to form a grandstand. Tons of sand are spread on the floor. St. Joseph's in Gelsenkirchen, deconsecrated in 2023, is one of twelve former houses of worship that, for one summer, will …