Your All-Encompassing Guide to Gallery Weekend Berlin
In preparation for the 2016 edition of Gallery Weekend Berlin, an extensive agenda of openings across the city’s art-filled neighborhoods that runs from April 29th–May 1st, scan through the shows of the 50 participating galleries, including our picks for exhibitions that absolutely should not be missed.
Mitte / Friedrichshain
A | Sebastian Black and Megan Rooney at Croy Nielsen
Weydingerstraße 10
April 29–June 4
In the main space, Black presents new abstract paintings in warm or cool colors, made up of soft, undulating shapes that are drawn from a cartoon puppy motif. While past works have resembled the puppy’s face, these new works no longer recall the original reference other than the occasional paw or muzzle. In the gallery’s Garage space, Rooney’s show, titled “Piggy Piggy,” continues her practice of paintings and installations inspired by her own narrative texts—past installations include inflatable pool fountains, upturned umbrellas, and mattresses covered with pillowy dolls.
B | Carsten Nicolai at Galerie Eigen+Art
Auguststraße 26
April 21–May 28
Tapping into his expertise in music as well as art, Nicolai’s show, “reflektor distortion,” is based around the idea that individuals have distorted perceptions of reality. The site-specific, ever-changing installation comprises a rotating basin filled with water, set nearby a wall of fluorescent lights that it reflects; all the while, speakers emit sound that disrupts the water’s surface.
C | Hiwa K and Tobias Zielony at KOW
Brunnenstraße 9
April 30–June 12
In his first solo show in Germany, Kurdistan-born artist and musician Hiwa K presents a series of videos. These include documentation of the artist’s involvement in 2011 protests in Sulaimany, Iraq, which were broadly underrepresented in the media, and his mixed-media installation commissioned by Serpentine Gallery, “It’s Spring And The Weather Is Great So Let’s Close All Object Matters” (2012). Zielony’s show builds upon his project “The Citizen,” a series of photographs documenting the issues that African refugees face in Germany, accompanied by articles contributed by 12 African newspapers in response to the images, which was shown in the German Pavilion at the 56th Venice Biennale.
D | Tobias Rehberger at neugerriemschneider
Linienstraße 155
April 19–May 21
Rehberger takes the collaborative spirit that is at the core of his practice to new heights with “presently.” The exhibition, a reconfiguration of the traditional group show, was realized with the help of over 60 artists, musicians, architects, and designers—individuals whom he calls friends, colleagues, and mentors.
E | Jochen Lempert at BQ
Weydingerstrasse 10
April 30–June 25
F | Christopher Williams at Capitain Petzel
Karl-Marx-Allee 45
April 29–June 4
G | Gert & Uwe Tobias and Christian Rosa at Contemporary Fine Arts
Am Kupfergraben 10
April 29–June 11
H | Horst Ademeit at Delmes & Zander
Rosa-Luxemburg-Straße 37
April 29–July 23
I | Jim Lambie at Gerhardsen Gerner
Linienstraße 85
April 29–June 1
J | Martin Honert at Johnen Galerie
Marienstraße 10
April 26–May 28
K | Ghada Amer at Kewenig Galerie
Brüderstraße 10
April 29–July 30
L | “In Deutschland: reloaded (II)” at Kicken Berlin
Linienstraße 161A
April 29–Sept. 2
M | Rachel Harrison at Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler
Karl-Liebknecht-Straße 29
April 30–June 25
N | Philippe Decrauzat at Mehdi Chouakri
Invalidenstraße 117
April 29–June 11
O | Tomi Ungerer at Michael Fuchs Galerie
Auguststraße 11-13
April 29–June 25
P | Egan Frantz at Galerie Nagel Draxler
Weydingerstraße 2/4
April 29–May 28
Q | Anne Collier and Victor Man at Galerie Neu
Collier: Linienstraße 119, April 29–May 28
Man: Mehringdamm 72, April 27–June 5
R | “WHAT’S MY NAME?” group show curated by Christiane Rekade at Michel Majerus Estate
Knaackstraße 12
April 28–April 2017
S | Mike Bouchet at Peres Projects
Karl-Marx-Allee 82
April 29–June 2
T | Eduardo T. Basualdo at PSM
Köpenicker Straße 126
April 30–May 28
U | Alexandre Singh, Craig Kauffman, and Thea Djordjadze at Sprüth Magers
Oranienburger Straße 18
April 30–June 25
Tiergarten / Schöneberg
A | Ed Fornieles at Arratia Beer
Potsdamer Straße 87
April 30–June 11
In his first solo show at the gallery, Fornieles transforms the space into a health food bar—filled with his sculpture, animation, film, and web-based art—which is focused on ideas of self-improvement and dieting. Fornieles creates parallels between a privileged, health-conscious lifestyle, and notions of the “American dream” and the Enlightenment.
B | Michael Rakowitz at Barbara Wien
Schöneberger Ufer 65
April 30–July 30
For his ongoing work The invisible enemy should not exist (2007–), Rakowitz has investigated the looting of artifacts at Baghdad’s National Museum of Iraq, which occurred following the U.S. invasion of the city in 2003. In this latest iteration of the project, the artist presents intricate new sculptures that reconstruct the lost artifacts, made from everyday found materials like newspaper, packaging, cardboard, and foil.
C | Harland Miller at Blain | Southern
Potsdamer Straße 77-87
April 30–July 30
Miller has built his career around paintings that cleverly appropriate book covers (most notably, Penguin Classics), swapping in ironic phrases and his own name in the place of the title, subtitle, and author. In his first-ever solo show in Germany, the artist debuts new large-scale paintings (nearly 10 feet in height) that feature original imagery, and the artist’s signature Penguin series, including the work that inspired the show’s title, Tonight We Make History (P.S. I Can’t Be There) (2016).
D | Andy Hope 1930 at Galerie Guido W. Baudach
Potsdamer Straße 85
April 29–May 28
In his new exhibition, Andy Hope 1930 (the alter ego of artist Andreas Hofer) has adopted recognizable motifs like the logo of Monster Energy drinks and red devil horns to create paintings that play with the associative power of images—and how we perceive these images outside of their expected contexts.
E | Ketuta Alexi-Meskhishvili at Galerie Micky Schubert
Genthiner Strasse 36
April 29–June 25
Alexi-Meskhishvili’s photographs range from images of staged models paying homage to forebearers like Lee Friedlander and Robert Mapplethorpe to snapshots that have been spliced together. Working with both digital and analog methods, her works are often bathed in gradations of soft blues, greens, and pinks, or picture her subjects before reflective surfaces, adding visual and narrative weight to the two-dimensionality of her medium.
F | Aleksandra Domanović at Tanya Leighton
Kurfürstenstraße 156 & 24/25
April 29–June 25
Known for robotic hands inspired by the first attempts to develop prostheses with a sense of touch and works that surface notions of cyberfeminism or the underlying politics that govern everyday life, Domanovic now turns her focus to the roles that animals play in society—from the Stone Age through the future. Titled “Bulls Without Horns,” and filling both gallery spaces, the show’s scope ranges from the symbolic value of animals to DNA experimentation and genetic modification.
G | Ernst Wilhelm Nay at Aurel Scheibler
Schöneberger Ufer 71
April 30–June 18
H | Tomás Saraceno at Esther Schipper
Schöneberger Ufer 65
April 26–May 28
I | Rirkrit Tiravanija at Helga Maria Klosterfelde Edition
Potsdamer Straße 97
April 30–July 30
J | Oscar Murillo at Galerie Isabella Bortolozzi
Schöneberger Ufer 61
April 3–June 25
K | Victor Man at Galeria Plan B
Potsdamer Straße 77-87
April 29–May 28
L | Petra Cortright at Société
Genthiner Straße 36
April 29–May 28
M | Adriano Costa at Supportico Lopez
Kurfürstenstraße 14b
April 29–June 18
Kreuzberg
A | Bettina Pousttchi at Buchmann Galerie
Charlottenstraße 13
April 29–July 16
Ahead of exhibitions at the Hirshhorn Museum and the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., Pousttchi shows exacting, ceramic squares in lattice patterns, which were inspired by the arrangements of wooden beams she saw in photographs of historic, half-timbered houses. The squares are displayed in careful, architectural formations that engage with the space, like tiles climbing up the walls.
B | Daniel Buren at Buchmann Galerie
Buchmann Box, Charlottenstraße 75
April 29–July 16
This show of early works by Buren comprises iconic 8.7-cm-wide stripe works that sit on the floor like objects, rather than paintings. Dating from 1966 and 1969, these are among the artist’s first signature works, which he created in situ across the world.
C | Mark Wallinger and Iman Issa at carlier | gebauer
Markgrafenstraße 67
April 30–May 28
Wallinger’s stunning “id Paintings” (2015) may resemble Rorschach prints, but they’re actually physical traces of the artist himself—created by covering his hands in paint and running them across canvases cut to the size of his arm span and height. In Issa’s “Heritage Studies,” her first exhibition with the gallery, the artist shows recent works from a series of sculptures inspired by artifacts in museums—like an astrolabe found in Iraq dating to 984 A.D.—and consider the relevance of these historic objects in the present.
D | Hanne Darboven at Galerie Crone
Rudi-Dutschke-Straße 26
April 30–June 18
This new show of Darboven’s work follows recent retrospectives at Haus der Kunst in Munich and Bundeskunsthalle in Bonn, and continues to explore the late conceptual master’s legacy. Best known for her minimalist installations, the show includes early works that preceded her use of systems of codes and numbers, as well as the rarely displayed 444-part installation Evolution Leibniz (1986).
E | Bernard Piffaretti at Klemm’s
Prinzessinnenstraße 29
April 29–June 11
In “No Chronology,” Piffaretti continues the practice of reflecting on the act of painting, while painting. In creating these works, his methodical process involved dividing his canvases vertically with a line of paint, creating an abstract image on one side, then replicating it on the other side.
F | Peles Empire at Wentrup
Tempelhofer Ufer 22
April 30–June 16
Artist duo Peles Empire bring their expansive practice into the gallery through a room-sized installation spanning sculpture, rugs, and wallpaper. The artists, Katharina Stöver and Barbara Wolff, are inspired by the anachronistic fusion of decorative styles they encountered in the historic Peles Castle in Romania; their work revolves around recreating the lush rooms there.
G | Annette Kelm, Claudia Comte, and “Gartenschau” at KÖNIG GALERIE
Alexandrinenstrasse 118-121
April 9–May 29; April 29–March 29; April 29–March 3, 2017
At St. Agnes, Kelm’s enigmatic photography fills the nave—images of everyday objects like playground equipment, pizza boxes, and dollar bills, set in bright colors and dynamic compositions—while Comte transforms the chapel space. In her first show with the gallery, Comte debuts a site-specific, highly designed installation comprised of 10 hanging wooden plinths, paintings, and refined wood sculptures. Outside, the gallery has assembled a sculpture garden, including a water sculpture by Tatiana Trouvé and an installation by Alicja Kwade, which is open to the public for the first time.
H | K.H. Hödicke at KÖNIG GALERIE
Johann König, Dessauerstraße 6-7
April 29–May 14
During the time of the Berlin Wall and the decade following, Neo-Expressionist painter Hödicke had his studio in the West Berlin neighborhood where Johann König’s gallery now resides. The paintings on view are the artist’s observations of the urban development of this part of the city during the GDR era.
I | Diango Hernández at Galerie Barbara Thumm
Markgrafenstraße 68
April 30–June 4
J | Maria Eichhorn at Galerie Barbara Weiss
Kohlfurter Straße 41/43
April 29–June 25
K | Olaf Holzapfel at Daniel Marzona
Friedrichstrasse 17
April 30–June 4
L | Julije Knifer at Galerija Gregor Podnar
Lindenstraße 35
April 30–June 18
M | Alice Channer at Konrad Fischer Galerie
Lindenstraße 34-35
April 29–June 18
N | Miriam Cahn at Meyer Riegger
Friedrichstraße 235
April 29–May 28
O | Michael Schmidt at Nordenhake
Lindenstraße 34
April 30–May 28
P | Idris Khan and Daniel Buren at Thomas Schulte
Charlottenstraße 24
April 30–June 25
Q | Pat O’Neill at VeneKlasen/Werner
Rudi-Dutschke-Straße 26
April 29–May 31
R | KwieKulik at Zak|Branicka
Lindenstraße 35
April 28–July 30
Charlottenberg
A | Wolfgang Tillmans at Galerie Buchholz
Fasanenstraße 30
April 29–June 18
For this new exhibition, titled “Studio,” Tillmans has taken stock of his workspace. Stripping away the behind-the-scenes allure of the artist’s studio, he presents documentary-like images of his space and its contents, depicting the various, shifting functions of this setting and its essential role in his practice as a photographer.
B | Richard Phillips at Mathew
April 29–June 11
Schaperstraße 12
Following Phillips’s fall 2015 show at Mathew’s New York outpost, in which he presented paintings that meshed stock imagery and the abstract tendencies of Christopher Wool and Albert Oehlen, the artist now debuts a series in Berlin inspired by Gerhard Richter. Taking cues from Richter’s abstract squeegee works, Phillips’s paintings echo the German artist’s idiosyncratic smears of paint over the faces of female subjects.
C | Edmund de Waal at Galerie Max Hetzler
Goethestraße 2/3; Bleibtreustraße 45
April 29–July 16
D | Paula Modersohn-Becker and Leiko Ikemura at Galerie Michael Haas
Niebuhrstraße 5; Kunst Lager Haas, Lise-Meitner-Straße 7-9
April 29–May 28
E | Per Kirkeby at Kunsthandel Wolfgang Werner
Fasanenstraße 72
April 30–June 2
Gallery Weekend Berlin takes place across the city April 29–May 1, 2016.