From September 13–18, Berlin will once again become the centre of the international art world. The fifth Berlin Art Week will attract collectors, gallerists, museum directors, and all those interested in art and culture to the German capital. Visitors will be directly drawn into Berlin’s art world and can choose from a wide variety of special offerings for this week. Immersing themselves in Berlin’s sites of exhibiting and producing art, they can visit solo exhibitions by Halil Altındere, Anne Imhof, Andreas Greiner, Sven Drühl, Yvonne Roeb or Gordon Parks, or one of the group shows at me Collectors Room or Deutsche Bank KunstHalle or the private collections of Julia Stoschek, Collection Regard, Ivo Wessel or Erika Hoffmann. Everything will revolve around contemporary art and what moves, influences, and motivates artists today: from science and technology, social processes and political developments, to the worlds of advertising surrounding us. Last but not least, the week’s two art fairs offer a good opportunity to see all of this together in one place -and perhaps even to make a purchase.
The ninth abc art berlin contemporary will once again be focussing on individual artists and their positions. Founded by a group of Berlin galleries, abc invites local and international galleries to present their work in an exhibition architecture designed by the architectural firm Johanna Meyer-Grohbrügge at Station Berlin. On September 16, the programme will be complemented by the abc gallery night, where participating galleries based in Berlin open their spaces around town (September 15–18). Berlin’s youngest art fair Positions Berlin – Art Fair has been presenting established galleries and newcomers or rediscoveries from the international art market since 2014. With fascinating concepts, interesting spaces, and new ideas, it offers visitors a framework to experience a wide range of international art during Berlin Art Week. 73 galleries from 13 countries present their most striking artistic positions at Postbahnhof Berlin (September 15–18). The 9th Berlin Biennale with the title The Present in Drag could be extended this year and will close with a grand finale during Berlin Art Week. The New York curatorial team DIS chose five locations, including Akademie der Künste, KW Institute of Contemporary Art and an apocalyptic-seeming ferry from the city’s Reederei Riedel. In the final days of the biennale, these locations will once again become points of discovery, with special art actions, talks, performances and happenings (September 13–18, special programme on September 14, 12pm–12am). Several art prizes will be on the programme this year as well: Andreas Greiner will be receiving the GASAG Art Award at Berlinische Galerie, a prize at the intersection of art, science, and technology. From flies, microorganisms and factory-farmed poultry to biological processes, explosions and musical notation, his spectrum of issues is just as wide reaching as the media he works with. Greiner uses them to describe the relationship of humanity, during our industrial and media society, to nature, art, and to himself (opening: September 14).
Anne Imhof, the winner of last year’s Preis der Nationalgalerie, will be presenting her eagerly awaited exhibition at Hamburger Bahnhof: she will be showing ANGST 2, an exhibition that is being staged as an opera in three acts, a combination of choreographed performance, painting, sculpture, and music. A falcon will play a role alongside an ensemble consisting of professional actors and amateur performers. The project is already considered the artist’s most ambitious to date (opening: September 14). The Neuer Berliner Kunstverein (n.b.k.) will be dedicating a solo exhibition to Turkish artist Halíl Altındere, who developed the Space Refugee-Project, ironically proposing outer space to house refugees in the face of European fear of being overwhelmed by foreigners. A central part of the exhibition is a film on the former Syrian cosmonaut Muhammad Ahmed Faris, who flew with the Soviet space ship Soyuz TM-3 for a seven-day stay on the space station Mir in 1987 (opening: September 14). In cooperation with n.b.k., HAU Hebbel am Ufer will be showing the artist’s work “Köfte Airlines” and his work “Homeland”, created for the 9th Berlin Biennale, is currently on view at Akademie der Künste.
