Berlin art: What exhibitions are on now?

New

Andy Warhol: After the Party

Behind nights out at Studio 54 and his iconic works of pop art, how much do we really know about Andy Warhol? ‘Beyond the Party’ uncovers Warhol’s little-known private side through a collection of intimate photographs taken by Warhol himself at the height of his fame.

• Fotografiska Museum Berlin, Oranienburger Str. 54, Mitte, details.
• 17.05 – 15.09.24. Opening event: 17.05.24 (8pm-4am), details.
• Price: €14 Mon-Wed, €15 Thurs-Fri, €16 Sat-Sun (€8 reduced) for entrance to all exhibitions. Free entrance on the first Tuesday of the month.

Last Chance

Poetics of Encryption

For many of us, the inner-workings of the technology we interface with on a daily basis remains a mystery. ‘Poetics of Encryption’ is a large-scale group exhibition which explores how the so-called Black Sites, Black Boxes and Black Holes in our technical information systems often leave us in the dark.

• KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Auguststr. 69, Mitte, details.
• 17.02 – 26.05.24
• Price: €10 (€5 reduced)

Echoes of the Brother Countries

While in many ways life in the DDR was incredibly isolated, the government of the Deutsches Democratic Republic actually facilitated many political, educational and artistic exchanges with socialist and socialist-friendly nations around the world. But the DDR’s relationship with these so-called Brüderländer (‘brother countries’) and their citizens was anything but simple. This exhibition examines the complex socio-cultural dynamics that came to the fore in this often forgotten aspect of DDR society.

• Haus der Kulturen der Welt, John-Foster-Dulles-Allee 10, Tiergarten, details.
• 02.03 – 20.05.24
• Price: €8 (€6 reduced), free on Mondays.

Chronoroma: Photographic Treasures of the 20th Century

Iconic scenes from 20th century fashion history, glamorous portraits and classic architectural shots. The images that make up this exhibition span six influential decades and include renowned works from the archive of Condé Nast.

• Museum für Fotografie, Jebensstr. 2, Charlottenburg, details.
• 15.02 – 20.05.24
• Price: €12 (€6 reduced)

VALIE EXPORT, Retrospective

With a box strapped to her naked chest, Austrian media and performance artist VALIE EXPORT invited passersby to reach their hands inside and touch her breasts. TAPP und TASTKINO (Touch Cinema) (1968) – one of EXPORT’s early “expanded cinema” actions – was designed to challenge notions of the voyeuristic gaze on the female body. It’s just one of the highlights of this major retrospective, which presents a comprehensive overview of the artist’s career.

• c/o Berlin, Hardenbergstr. 22-24, Charlottenburg, details.
• 27.01 – 21.05.24
• Price: €12 (€6 reduced)

Yulia Mahr, Unbecoming

As its name hints at, ‘Unbecoming’ is a study of things which are both unsightly and in the process of becoming onedone. Through this collection of photographic work, Hungarian-born and UK-based artist Yulia Mahr aims to uncover the beauty hidden underneath the moments we often find most ugly and disturbing – death, decay, the process of ageing and even the pain and gore of childbirth.

• Wehrmuehle, Wehrmühlenweg 8, Biesenthal, details.
• 27.04 – 26.05.24
• Price: Free admission

Coming Soon

Goddesses and Consorts: Women in Ancient Myth

Horrid Medusa, passionate Aphrodite, ever-faithful Penelope: Reductionist and stereotypical depictions of women have existed since (and well before) the days of ancient mythology. Inspired by critically feminist readings of ancient texts, ‘Goddesses and Consorts: Women in Ancient Myth’ aims to provide a more nuanced look at the expectations, myths and real lives of women in ancient times.

• Altes Museum, Bodestr. 1-3, Mitte, details.
• 24.05.24 – 16.03.25
• Price: €12 (€6 reduced)

Marianna Simnett: Winner

‘Winner’ is a multichannel film installation commissioned for the art and culture programme of the UEFA EURO 2024 tournament. It explores the beautiful game through a three-act ballet, looking at football’s socially constructed power hierarchies, crowd psychology, and constant pressure to perform.

Simnett adapted the film from the 1954 short story The Destructors by British author Graham Greene, and her adaptation is performed by a group of contemporary dancers playing fans, players, ticket officers and wardens. The film’s hallucinatory world extends beyond the screen into the exhibition space and museum garden, as visitors are guided through the installation by barriers, like those you would find in a stadium, as the film itself spreads around the space. You’ll even be occasionally interrupted by vendors offering hotdogs and beer.

• Hamburger Bahnhof, Invalidenstr. 50, Mitte, details.
• 17.05.24 – 03.11.24
• Price: €12 (€6 reduced) for entrance to all exhibitions at the Hamburger Bahnhof.

Nan Goldin: This Will Not End Well

After winning the Käthe Kollwitz Prize in 2022, artist and activist Nan Goldin is getting one of the greatest prizes of all: a full-scale retrospective at Berlin’s most prestigious art museum. ‘This WIll Not End Well’ showcases the photographer’s work at the end of the twentieth century, when she captured her friends and lovers immersed in a fluid, hedonistic bohemia, full of joy, sensuality and suffering.

• Neue Nationalgalerie, Potsdamer Str. 50, Mitte, details.
• 23.11.24 – 23.02.25
• Price: €14 (€7 reduced) for entrance to all exhibitions at the Neue Nationalgalerie.

Now Showing

Ré-imaginer le passé & Franz Wanner, Mind the Memory Gap

The group show ‘Ré-imaginer le passé’ brings together ten artists and collectives from the Global South working in a range of mediums (including textiles, paintings and scent) for a critical examination of the region’s colonial history. Also on at the KINDL is Franz Wanner’s ‘Mind the Memory Gap’, which uses precise photography and analytical texts to report on some of the many German companies that profited off forced labour during Nazi rule.

• KINDL Centre for Contemporary Art, Am Sudhaus 3, Neukölln, details.
• Ré-imaginer le passé: 24.03 – 28.07.24 and Franz Wanna, Mind the Memory Gap: 24.03 – 14.07.24.
• Price: €7-€10 (€4 reduced)

Alexandra Pirici, Attune

On a physical, social and even chemical level, we tend to view human and non-human elements as having little to do with one another. To disrupt this, the artist and choreographer Alexandra Pirici brings together two highly unpredictable and unstable natural elements – sand and the human body. Every day, members of Pirici’s ensemble perform, sing and dance among large piles of sand, taking over the central hall of the Hamburger Bahnhof.

Performances take place from 1-5pm on Monday-Wednesday and Friday-Sunday, and 3-7pm on Thursday.

• Hamburger Bahnhof, Invalidenstr. 50, Mitte, details.
• 25.04 – 06.10.24
• Price: €14 (€7 reduced)

Kader Attia, J’accuse

Cultural assets lost and damaged during the colonial era, the disfigured faces of WWI soldiers: Fundamentally, French-Algerian artist Kader Attia is interested in principles of repair. Through two installations The Object’s Interlacing (2020) and the eponymous J’Accuse (2016), Attia tries to build an understanding of restitution as a practice of repair.

• Berlinische Galerie, Alte Jakobstr. 124-128, Kreuzberg, details.
• 27.04 – 19.08.24
• Price: €6

Caspar David Friedrich, Infinite Landscapes

Marking the 250th anniversary of the German’s artist’s birth, ‘Caspar David Friederich, Infinite Landscapes’ is one exhibition not to miss this year. On show will be over sixty paintings and fifty drawings by Friederich, including his well known Artic Sea, Chalk Cliffs on Rügen and Monk by the Sea.

• Alte Nationalgalerie, Bodestr. 1-3, Mitte, details.
• 19.04 – 04.08.24
• Price: €16 (€8 reduced)

Modigliani: Modern Gazes

Bringing together over eighty paintings, drawings and sculptures by Modigliani, as well as his contemporaries (including Gustav Klimt, Paula Modersohn-Becker, Egon Schiele, Pablo Picasso and Jeanne Mammen), ‘Modigliani: Modern Gazes’ is the first retrospective of the artist’s work in Germany in fifteen years, and puts a special focus on Modigliani’s prolific nude female portraits.

• Museum Barberini, Humboldtstr. 5-6, Potsdam, details.
• 27.04 – 18.08.24
• Price: €16 (€10 reduced)

Akeem Smith, SOUNDCLASH

Akeem Smith, who grew up in the USA and Jamaica, transforms the open-plan space of Heidi with his dynamic sound installation ‘SOUNDCLASH’. Smith examines the meaning of ‘loudness’ – whether that be in an auditory, visual or behavioural sense, and places it up against prevailing norms and accepted decorum. 

• Heidi, Kurfürstenstr. 145, Schöneberg, details.
• 27.04 – 01.06.24
• Price: Free admission

Nancy Holt: Circles of Light

For more than five decades, Nancy Holt used her practice of large-scale, often outdoor installations, as a way to understand our relationship with the spaces around us. ‘Circle of Light: Experiments with Sound, Image, Objects 1966-1987’ is the most comprehensive retrospective of the artist’s work in Germany to date, and traces the stories of some of her most impactful artworks.

• Gropius Bau, Niederkirchnerstr. 7, Kreuzberg-Mitte, details.
• 22.03 – 21.07.24
• €15 (€10 reduced)

Soft Power 

Often dismissed as lowly womens’ work fit only for the domestic sphere, textile art is being put in the spotlight with the exhibition ‘Soft Power’. Celebrating the ways in which textiles, fibre art and soft sculpture-making have been used as disruptive forces against traditional styles of cultural production, this exhibition also examines the webs of productions and trade that continue to transport textiles and the people who produce them across continents.

• DAS MINSK, Max-Planck-Str. 17, Potsdam details.
• 16.03 – 11.08.24
• Price: €10 (€8 reduced)

Michelle Jezierski, Verge

It’s worth the heading down to Steglitz to see this Berlin-based painter’s first solo institution exhibition. A well-known figure on the scene, Jezierski’s wonderfully evocative canvases mix gestural freedom with tight geometric ruthlessness.

• Schwartzsche Villa, Grunewaldstr. 55, Steglitz, details.
• 22.03 – 18.08.24
• Price: Free entry

Joseph Beuys: Sammlungspräsentation 

One of the most influential figures in Modern art, Joseph Beuyes is being celebrated with a large-scale new exhibition at the Hamburger Bahnhof. Made up of around 15 works, including important installations like Tram Stop: A monument to the future (1976) and Das Kapital Raum, 1970-1977 (1980), the exhibition showcases the complex life and work of Beuys.

• Hamburger Bahnhof, Invalidenstr. 50-51, Mitte, details
• 22.03.24 – Until further notice
• Price: To be confirmed

More Than Human: Design After the Anthropocene

Get excited for a new discursive programme of pop-up exhibitions, lectures and workshops exploring the complexities of non-human life. 

• Kunstgewerbemuseum, Matthäikirchplatz, Mitte, details.
• 22.03.24 – Until further notice
• Price: €10 (€5 reduced)

Shirin Neshat, The Fury

Through a series of stunning black and white video and photo works, Neshat aims to tell the stories of sexually exploited female political prisoners in the Republic of Iran.

• Fotografiska, Oranienburger Str. 54, Mitte details.
• 08.03 – 09.06.25
• Price: €14 Mon-Wed, €15 Thurs-Fri, €16 Sat-Sun (€8 reduced) for entrance to all exhibitions. Free entrance on the first Tuesday of the month.

Audre Lorde: The Berlin Years

The influential queer, African-American poet and activist Audre Lorde spent a number of influential years in West Berlin between 1984 and 1992. This photo-exhibition features images taken of Lorde by her friends and colleagues, both in her personal and private life, and tells the story of the influential figure’s time here.

• FHXB Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg Museum, Adalbertstr. 95A, Kreuzberg, details.
• 20.02 – 30.06.24
• Price: Free admission

George Grosz: A Piece of my World Without Peace – The Collages

Uncovering the artist’s lesser known collage works, a new exhibition from this eponymously named little museum traces Grosz’s early photomontages. Just as witty as his drawings and paintings, these collages illustrate the hustle and bustle of the artist’s life in Berlin, as well as his wry perspectives on his exiled years in America.

• Das Kleine Grosz Museum, Bülowstr. 18, Schöneberg, details.
• 11.01 – 03.06.24
• Price: €10 (€6 reduced)

Extreme Tension: Art between politics and society – Collection of the Nationalgalerie 1945 – 2000

An expansive survey of art created during the second half of the 20th century, ‘Extreme Tension’ showcases a number of daring and diverse artworks. Political and social unrest characterised the post-war collection, which features key works from East and West Germany, Western Europe, the Soviet Union and the USA.

• Neue Nationalgalerie, Potsdamer Str. 50, Mitte, details.
• 18.11.23 – 28.09.25
• Price: €14 (€7 reduced) for entrance to all exhibitions at the Neue Nationalgalerie.

Flow: The Exhibition on Menstruation

Combining personal accounts, archival objects, interviews, music, film and art, ‘Flow: The Exhibition on Menstruation’ examines the discourses, debates and culture around periods. Why is there still a stigma about menstruation? How can we dismantle the culture of shame? And why does modern science still have so far to go in this field? These are just a few of the questions at the core of this exhibition.

• Museum Europäischer Kulturen, Arnimallee 25, Dahlem, details.
• 06.10.23 – 06.10.24
• Price: €8 (€4 reduced)

Unbound: Performance as Rupture

A group exhibition examining how artists of different generations have related to the body, ‘Unbound: Performance as Rupture’ focuses on significant works of video art and (recorded) performance art. 

• Julia Stoschek Foundation, Leipziger Str. 60, Mitte, details.
• 14.09.23 – 28.07.24
• Price: €5

Roads not Taken

This new exhibition at the Deutsches Historisches Museum looks back at a series of decisive historical events throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, imagining what would have happened if things had turned out differently. Exploring alternative outcomes to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the first presence of tanks at Checkpoint Charlie, the Nazi’s election victory and more. For the exhibition, staged pictures are juxtaposed with documentation of real events, such as the nuclear explosion in Nevada in 1957.

• Deutsches Historisches Museum, Unter den Linden 2, Mitte, details.
• 09.12.22 – 24.11.24
• Price: €7 (€3.50 reduced), free admission for visitors under 18.