In an interview with Martin Gostner in 2002, Udo Kittelmann cited the Brechtian figure of Herr K., who, when asked what he was doing at the moment, said that he was having a hard time planning his next mistake. Following tracks that might prove misleading, taking detours, and keeping one’s distance from the supposedly familiar have been important elements in Gostner’s artistic practice, a complex one that consciously misuses media and symbols to make simple linear readings impossible and thereby open up new vistas. In “Them Powers,” his recent exhibition in Cologne, Gostner extended this strategy