Berlin Art Week 2024

The 13th edition of Berlin Art Week will take place from 11-15 SEP 2024.

Berlin Art Week is both a festival and a gathering of the most important players in the contemporary art scene. It stands for new discoveries, coming together, exchange & the highest level of artistic work. Once a year, always in September, over 100 institutions - from large museums, fairs and well-known exhibition venues to young project spaces, numerous galleries and private collections - present artistic positions from all over the world. Experts, culture enthusiasts, artists, international and national guests come together at exhibitions, performances and screenings and create an extraordinary space for exchange.

We attended the press tour on Monday, 09.11.2024, and were able to gain a first impression. Simone Leimbach, Head of Exhibitions & Events Department Kulturprojekte Berlin, Mona Stehle, Artistic Director Berlin Art Week and Jenny Schlenzka, Director Gropius Bau, welcomed us with an inspiring speech in the BAW Garden in the Gropius Bau, which was moved to the foyer due to the weather.

The BAW Garden, festival meeting point of Berlin Art Week, is this year's guest at the Gropius Bau. Free and outdoors, it is the perfect place for exchange, planning and reflection. The five-day program offers activities such as workshops, dance sessions, performances, talks, films in the open-air cinema, culinary surprises and DJ sets. The Thaipark Cooking Session will certainly be a highlight: after Rirkrit Tiravanija.

The new exhibition DAS GLÜCK IST NICHT IMMER LUSTIG by Rikrit Tirvanija was also our first stop on the tour. The new exhibition sheds light on Tirvanija's art, which has been created in Germany since the 1990s and deals with themes such as migration, cultural idiosyncrasies and the political present. He expands the classical concept of art by focusing on social interactions and sensual experiences. For the first time, the exhibition brings together works that show his close connection to Berlin and includes a diverse selection of media. The title refers to Rainer Werner Fassbinder's film Angst essen Seele auf (Fear Eats the Soul) and points to the continuing relevance of racism.

If you're already at the Gropius Bau, we recommend you make a stop on the first floor. Because since 04.09.2024, BAUBAU has been inviting children to play, laugh, run around and do nothing - in an exhibition building. The play area, designed by artist Kerstin Brätsch, features huge, colorful wallpaper, structures, objects and various "loose parts" that allow the children's activities to shape the space. There are no rules here - the children decide what happens, making the place a constantly changing space of possibilities. One already has the feeling that Jenny Schlenzka, as the new director of the Gropius Bau, will initiate very important new ideas.

From there, we took the coach to the Berlinische Galerie. There we were greeted by Thomas Köhler, Director of the Berlinische Galerie, and artist Mariechen Danz. "edge out" is the title of Danz's new exhibition, for which she has been awarded the GASAG Art Prize 2024. In her artistic practice, Mariechen Danz deals with human knowledge and combines scientific systems with alternative, subjective and magical ways of thinking. In her exhibition "edge out", she transforms the entrance hall of the Berlinische Galerie into an expansive installation in which the floor and walls are connected by sculptural interventions. Her works are based on an extensive visual language that takes up themes such as anatomy, cartography and technology. Representations of human organs appear as sculptural forms or shadow plays that reflect timeless political and social influences on the body. Impressive.

Hop on, hop off to Kranzler Eck, a famous former Berlin café on Unter den Linden boulevard in the historic center of the capital. For Art Week 2024, CCA will be back in the premises, which can be used for various purposes. CCA Berlin-Center for Contemporary Arts presents THE ECHO OF PROTEST IS DISTANT TO THE PROTEST, the first solo exhibition by Berlin-based artist Nazanin Noori. With a background in theater, film and experimental music, Noori combines sound, space, sculpture and post-dramatic poetry to create atmospheric narratives that traverse genres such as ambient hardcore and doom electronics. The exhibition explores the emotional mobilization of the public and the spectacle of suffering in political protests. Through new immersive works, Noori creates quasi-stage spaces that reinterpret classic dramaturgical devices such as kitsch and irony, raising questions about the presence and psychic afterlife of protest.

Next, artist Gisèle Vienne and director Anna Gritz awaited us at Haus am Waldsee. Vienne is showing "This Causes Consciousness to Fracture - A Puppet Play". In collaboration with the Georg Kolbe Museum and Sophiensælen, Vienne's complex practice, which combines photography, sculpture, choreography and theater, will be shown during Art Week 2024 in Berlin. In her multi-layered work, the French-Austrian artist, choreographer and director explores the dreams and abysses of adolescence and counterculture. Anthropomorphic figures, puppets, masks and dancers and actors embody the longings, fears and subversive potential of childhood in her works. In an exhibition staged for the Haus am Waldsee, a field of tension is created between self-determination and heteronomy that questions conventional patterns of perception. Puppetry with a difference.

The last stop on the route was Fluentum. Fluentum presents THEATER, a solo exhibition by artist duo Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff, which explores the radical changes in performance art today. The exhibition marks the launch of their new episodic film, the first three episodes of which were commissioned by Fluentum and will premiere in September. The setting and filming location is the New Theater Hollywood in Los Angeles, which Henkel and Pitegoff have been running since 2024. The film combines fiction and documentation of rehearsals there and tells the story of Kennedy, who buys a theater after an accident and tries to form an ensemble. The exhibition builds on earlier works such as her photo series Casts and the film Paradise and explores questions of documentation, collective memory and the performance of work.

Highlights of Art Week 2024

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, Berlin experienced a transition from past to future. The 1990s were characterized by political upheaval and a new, self-confident generation. In an exhibition organized by the OSTKREUZ agency, C/O Berlin is showing works by Sibylle Bergemann, Harald Hauswald and other photographers that document the turbulent period after the fall of the Wall and the social transformation. Around 260 photographic works are on display, including iconic and previously unpublished images. An accompanying publication complements the exhibition.

This year's POSITIONS Berlin Art Fair presents 111 international galleries from 24 countries with their most important positions in contemporary and modern art. Every year during Berlin Art Week, the galleries have the opportunity to present their programs to a broad international audience. The fair takes place in the impressive Hangars 6 and 7 of the former Berlin-Tempelhof airport, which offer an extremely exciting atmosphere with their 16 meter high ceilings and light-flooded halls covering over 12,000 square meters. In addition to the exhibition, there will be special exhibitions, award ceremonies, talks and the Berlin Art Week Collectors Dinner. PS Thursday evening is the opening party with drinks and a DJ - always worth a visit.

"After Images" presents over 25 works, including six new productions and interventions that push the boundaries of time-based art. The group exhibition at the Julia Stoschek Foundation Berlin focuses on haptic and multisensory experiences rather than visual media such as film and video, shifting the focus from the screen to embodied experience. Curated by Lisa Long, Line Ajan and Josefin Granetoft, After Images explores the often favored sensory perception of sight and instead offers artworks that create meaning through materiality, texture, movement and immersive experiences.

Dynamic art frequency at MaHalla. TOGETHER is a 5-day art festival during Berlin Art Week. 12 curators and teams have selected around 100 international artists who have the freedom to transcend conventions and create an innovative program.

Over 50 of the city's most important galleries open their doors on Friday until late into the night for openings, parties and performances - a must for all night owls.

The exhibition "Milky Way" by Danish artist Esben Weile Kjær at Trauma Berlin combines sculpture and performance to explore youth culture and social rituals. Kjær erects a walk-in concrete installation that quotes Soviet playgrounds and bunkers of the Atlantic Wall. Neon flowers and stained glass windows, inspired by NASA imagery and historical amusement sites, contrast the brutalist design. The exhibition questions how architectural structures and rituals can be reinterpreted and symbolically reinterpreted while the past continues to resonate. "Milky Way" is a precursor to Kjær's next solo exhibition Solar System in Denmark.

rare possibility: The BOROS COLLECTION opens its doors on the last day of Art Week 2024. Get lost in the labyrinthine exhibition rooms and explore the private collection of Karen and Christian Boros.

GUIDED TOURS

If you feel like finally handing over the responsibility, you can discover Berlin Art Week in a special way! Organized by Art Week in collaboration with Museumsdienst Berlin, you can explore Berlin's most exciting neighbourhoods on foot or by bike - from Mitte to Kreuzberg and Neukölln to Charlottenburg. Accompanied by experts, you will be guided to new art and interesting places. The participation fee is 10.

ROUTES

If giving up control is a bit too much for you, but you still need the feeling of being taken by the hand, this year you can discover the carefully curated routes in collaboration with Berlin Art Link. From the city center to the city limits - always between 4 and 15 stops. We love it.

ANYWAY: (R)going out is always worthwhile and as Richard Serra says: "Your eye is a muscle... keep it in shape." 🫂