Spring seems to be awakening the best in the art scene, too: this month we are treated with quite a few art fairs & festivities, at home in Berlin and in the neighborhood abroad. Check out what is not to be missed. 

 

THURSDAY 12.04

19.00 Plotting the Path @ Romanian Cultural Institute (RKI Berlin)

WHY: George Anghelescu, Adrian Preda, Lea Rasovszky and Ștefan Ungureanu employ drawing as a founding matrix, infusing it with energy from adjacent media, such as painting, object and installation. „Plotting the Path“ is the launching event of the books produced by the four artists. They will be exhibiting a series of works representative for their development, and which have become intimately iconic to them. The project revolves around promoting artist books in direct connection with the works that they substitute in the reader's library as well as for the contemporary art consumer.

Romanian Cultural Institute / Reinhardtstr. 14, 10117 Berlin, U Oranienburger Tor / open through 23.05 / more info

 

11.00 SUPERMARKET Stockholm Independent Art Fair 2018

WHY: The goal of Supermarket – Stockholm Independen Art Fair is to provide a showcase of artists’ initiatives from all over the world and to create opporttunities for new networks on Swedish and international art scene. Its 2018 edition shows 53 artist-run initiatives from 41 cities around the world.The overarching theme this year is „Legacy: Who Will Survive And What Will be Left of Them?“. It discusses the heritage of art and the fleeting nature of human legacy, the issues of sustainability of the artist-run art scene, or the impact that artists have as individuals.

Slaughterhouse 5 / Fållan 10, Meatpacking district, Stockholm / ongoing until 15.04. / more info

 

FRIDAY 13.04

19.00 Capitalo, Chthulu, and a Much Hotter Compost Pile @ Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien

WHY: In an attempt to reject essentialist propositions and engage with postcolonial ecological thought, „Capitalo, Chthulu, and a Much Hotter Compost Pile" shows artistic positions that consider alternative ontological politics, reflect on environmental questions, and speculate on possible narrations for our precarious times. These are stories of life (and non-life) told from the other side, to rethink how humans can fit, co-belong, co-produce, co-weave and com-post within this web of life.

Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien / Mariannenplatz 2, 10997 Berlin, U Kottbusser Tor / open through 10.06 / more info

 

23.59 Open call for "<Interrupted = “Cyfem and Queer>”

WHY: Creamcake's first experimental symposium called "<Interrupted = “Cyfem and Queer>” is a day- and night-long series of conversations, lectures, and performances taking place on  April 28 at Südblock. The project is dedicated to formulating strategies for queering the blurred line between science, music, and art. Be part of the project and send your project proposal until April 13, 2018.

More info

 

SATURDAY 14.04

18.00 David Krippendorff – „Nothing Escapes My Eyes“ @ Katharina Maria Raab

WHY: „Nothing Escapes My Eyes“ is about a silent transformation of a place and a human being. The film was inspired by the famous opera „Aida“, to metaphorically depict current issues of cultural identity, loss, and the pressures to conform. The film refers to a historical event related to the opera „Aida“ premiered in Cairo in 1871 at the Khedivial Opera House. Although this building has been destroyed, the place is still named Opera Square: Meidan El Opera. The personal and urban transformation tackles on issues of identity, loss, and disorientation as a result of historical colonialism and contemporary globalization.

Katharina Maria Raab / Keithstr. 5, 10787 Berlin, U Wittenbergplatz / open through 09.06 / more info

 

WEDNESDAY 18.04

19.00  A fairytale from Saint and Sinners @ Meinblau Projektraum

WHY: „A fairytale from Saint and Sinners“ is a project by Flaut M. Rauch and Ann Schomburg that deals with the meaning and nonsense of old images of sin, saints, whores, and intermediate beings. The O Ton is presented through works by five artists from Kassel and Berlin whose works deal with contemporary life and mystical references. The exhibition is accompanied by „Stolen Images“, an exhibition within the exhibition, which presents a collective fever dream with works by over 30 artists and a screening program.

Meinblau Projektraum / Christinenstr. 18-19, 10119 Berlin, U Senefelderplatz / open through 29.04 / more info

 

THURSDAY 19.04

12.00 Poppositions @ Former Ateliers Coppens

WHY: POPPOSITIONS is an annual assembly in Brussels of galleries, artist initiatives, and project spaces. Conceived in 2011 as an experiment with the art fair format, POPPOSITIONS aims to occupy an independent and critical position. There are no white booths; instead, POPPOSITIONS presents emerging talent in a site-specific context, occupying a different space each year. It is both a curated exhibition and an ongoing critical dialogue. Its 7th edition will take place in Brussels at the former Ateliers Coppens.

Ateliers Coppens / Place du Nouveau Marché aux Grains 22-23 Nieuwe Graanmarkt ,1000 Brussels, Belgium / open through 22.04 / more info  

 

FRIDAY 20.04

10.00 Covered in Time and History: The Films of Ana Mendieta @ Gropius Bau

WHY: Ana Mendieta (1948-1985) is one of the outstanding artistic positions of the 1970s and 1980s. Her work moves freely between the disciplines of body art, land art and performance art, without being bound to a particular medium or single movement. From 20 April to 22 July 2018 the exhibition „Covered in Time and History: The Films of Ana Mendieta” at Gropius Bau will show 23 of Mendieta's multi-layered film works, which after several years of research have been restored and digitised.

Gropius Bau /  Niederkirchnerstr. 7, 10963 Berlin, S+U Potsdamer Platz / open through 22.07 / more info

 

19.00 Anna Steele – „The Arrangement“ @ Weserhalle

WHY: „The Arrangement“ is a selection of new paintings by Anna Steele made in Berlin at the crossover of Winter into Spring. The works are composed with a focus on line, form, and elements of architecture. The painted forms continually arrange themselves like objects as each layer of paint dissolves borders and moves the forms towards their absence. The resolved composition becomes a dichotomy of presence and absence, an abstraction of something glimpsed and remembered and filtered through the hand.

Weserhalle / Weserstr. 56, 12045 Berlin, U Rathaus Neukölln / open through 04.05 / more info

 

19.00 Glenn Peeters – „Under the Little Signs of Possessed Exuberance“ @ Das Gift

WHY:The work of artist Glenn Peeters lies in the moment that it becomes elusive and that you, as a spectator, are thrown at yourself. Glenn constantly has the desire to freeze his thoughts and actions at the strongest moment of his thinking. His work consists of paintings and sculptures. The work comes from actions, methods, and ritual processes. Sometimes methods that are instinctive, spontaneous, and physical, and at other times meticulous, anticipatory negotiations.

Das Gift / Donaustr. 119, 12043 Berlin, U Rathaus Neukölln / open through 29.04 / more info

 

19.00 Welträtsel (Floating Mountains, Breathing Glaciers) @ Scotty

WHY: To kick off this year's new exhibition series on the theme „How Things Appear“, Scotty has invited three Norwegian artists – Line Hvoslef, Maja Nilsen, and Randi Nygård – who explore different views and relations to nature through paintings, installations, collage, and sculptural objects. Some works relate to current political and environmental issues; others to how we are affected by places and landscapes or how the forces of nature influence society. In poetic ways the artists work with social and natural relations which are normally hard to grasp.

Scotty / Oranienstr. 46, 10969 Berlin, U Moritzplatz / open through 02.06 / more info

 

SATURDAY 21.04

19.00 Producing Roma Feminist Art @ District Berlin

WHY: Margaret Tali will discuss the meanings of Romani exclusion and what it has to tell us about artistic scenes, their nature and alignments by focusing on the work of an outstanding Finnish-Romani artist, writer and activist, Kiba Lumberg, who advocates her artistic practice as a human right. Mihaela Drăgan presents Giuvlipen, the first Roma feminist theatre company formed by professional actresses of Roma origins in Bucharest. In her talk, she covers the discourse in Roma art practice as it developed in parallel to the escalation of anti-Gypsyism and stronger stereotypes concerning Roma women.

District Berlin / Bessemerstr. 2-14, 12103 Berlin, U Alt-Tempelhof / more info