Berlin Culture Crawl

Last Post

2011-10-07T10:11:00.000+02:00

This is Berlin Culture Crawl's last post. Thanks to all who stopped by!

Catch the Piano Fever

2011-06-22T13:00:00.002+02:00

The Kulturforum comes alive with Klavierfieber, a week-long festival linking art works in the Neue Nationalgalerie, the Alte Nationalgalerie, the Pergamonmuseum and the Neues Museum with compositions for the piano inspired by them. Klavierfieber brings together six works of art, six young composers and six international pianists.

The concept is a novel one: the link between art and music is not intended to be merely decorative. Six composers were commissioned to create pieces for the piano, taking their inspiration directly from a painting or sculpture. The results are intriguing: Jens Joneleit (his opera Metanoia was premiered at the Staatsoper's opening at the Schiller Theater last year) created Schnitt ("Cuts"), using a Dada-ist composition form inspired by Hannah Höchs's Dada Collage; and the Danish-German composer Nils Eichberg presents his Nefertiti, to be performed by the brilliant 20-something Russian pianist Denis Kozhukin, who is making waves at all the top European competitions.

Compared to the large music/art festivals with long traditions in Berlin -- the Tanz im August, the Musikfest in September, the Art Forum in October, the Jazzfest in November -- Klavierfieber is diminutive: six evening and lunch/teatime concerts, six pianists, composers and works of art. But it has a special significance for Berlin cultural life. If the Klavierfieber proves infectious, it will rejuvenate the Kulturforum.

Klavierfieber is supported by the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation and Young Euro Classic. It takes place between Monday, June 20, and Sunday, June 26 in the Kulturforum -- in the museums as well as in the Staatsbibliothek (State Library) and the St Matthäuskirche (St. Matthew's Church).
The English page of the festival web site is here.

Taking Classical Music outside the Concert Hall (2)

2011-06-18T01:43:00.000+02:00

The building opposite the Schlossplatz in which you find one of Berlin's premier music conservatories, the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler, once housed the royal stables. The exterior is neo-baroque, the interior sleekly modern. In the Galakutschensaal (literally, the carriage hall) you can hear wonderful music for free.

The conservatory has a rich program of events all through the year: concerts, master classes, lecture concerts, workshops, international music contests -- and the standard is always high. There is a closer, more intimate relationship between the performers and audience than in the concert hall. I like sneaking in well before the concerts or master classes begin. The spacious quietness in the room -- soaring ceilings, parquet floors, two black Bösendorfer grand pianos. tall windows letting in a view of the Dom, the Spree and the green quadrant of the Schlossplatz -- is a first intimation of the purity of sound that will follow.

You can check Hanns Eisler's concert schedule here. The Hanns Eisler and the Universität der Künste have teamed up to form the Jazz-Institut Berlin on the Einsteinufer, and some great free concerts are on offer at this location, too. The Jazz-Institut's program is available here.

An unusual series outside the concert hall takes place in the Bröhan-Museum in Charlottenburg. In Berlin's museum for Art Nouveau decorative arts, music students give concerts on the first Thursday of every month. In their interaction with the audience, musicians make imaginative connections between the 30-minute program and a selected museum piece. The next concert is on Thursday, July 7, at 14:00. Tickets (which includes entrance to the museum) are 4 EUR.

My last tip for this post is the "Jour Fixe" free concert series at the Musikinstrumenten Museum (or the MIM) every other Wednesday afternoon. Once again, the performers are from Berlin's music conservatories. Originally, the program was reserved exclusively for the piano; now it includes a broad spectrum of solo and chamber music.

The concerts begin at 15:30, but this is a very popular little series for those "in the know." So get there at 14:30 to pick up your ticket, then wander around the museum (or find something interesting to do around Potsdamer Platz) till doors to the music auditorium open. The next "Jour Fixe" is on Wednesday, June 29. Check MIM's concert calendar here.

Taking Classical Music Outside the Concert Hall

2011-05-14T13:46:00.002+02:00

You can ditch the jacket and tie, the black dress and string of pearls, for these great low-key concerts that take place outside the concert halls or during lunch hours.

To begin with, there are noontime concerts presented by leading Berlin orchestras such as the free Lunch Concerts at the Berlin Philharmonie. Judging by swelling audience numbers, the Philharmonie's Lunch Concerts are no longer a well-kept secret -- a favorite with tourists, office workers on breaks and visitors to the Kulturforum. Every Tuesday at 13:00, you can stop by to hear soloists of the Berliner Philharmoniker in a 30-40 minute chamber music concert. The mini-concerts also feature soloists from the Deutsche Symphonie Orchester (DSO) and the Staatskapelle Berlin or conservatory students. Seats go fast, but you can find stairs and coat-check counters on which to sit, or look out over the foyer from the first floor. There's a fine lunch to go with the music, but unlike the arts the lunch is not for free.

The fourth floor of the Maison de France on Kurfürstendamm is the venue for the DSO's own lunchtime series. La Bonne Heure takes place every first and third Wednesday of the month, beginning at 12:45. The program, featuring mostly French chamber music, runs about 45 minutes and is accompanied by French catering in a wonderfully retro 1950-s bar and a view over Ku'damm. Taking your seat at La Bonne Heure is like taking a deep breath in the midst of a busy day.

Another series to watch out for: the Espresso Concerts at the Konzerthaus on Gendarmenmarkt, beginning in the 2011-12 season. Sebastian Nordmann, who recently took over as director, has given programming at the Konzerthaus an overhaul, letting in a fresh breeze. The 2011-12 season, called "Open", aims to bring the public into the Konzerthaus throughout the day instead of only during evening performance hours, and the Espresso Konzerte are one of these open invitations. These 45-minute midday concerts will take place on the last Wednesday of each month at 14:00. The ticket price includes an espresso -- a welcome freebie for those who have to return to the office, library or practice room.

Sol Gabetta, artist-in-residence at the Konzerthaus next season.
Photo: copyright, Marco Borggreve: with kind permission of the Konzerthaus Berlin

There's lots more: concerts in museums, studios and music conservatories. So stay tuned.

The next Lunch Concert is on Tuesday, May 17. Entrance is free. The program is usually announced shortly before the concert. This series runs till June 28, 2011. For more information see the Berlin Philharmonic's website.

The next La Bonne Heure is on Wednesday, May 18. The Masion de France is on Kurfürstendamm 211. Tickets are 6 EUR and you should make a reservation. For more information see the DSO's website.

The Espresso Konzerte series begins in the 2011-12 season. For dates, check the Konzerthaus website, the season brochure, or the monthly program calendar available at the concert hall. The program is advertised only shortly before the concert. The concert location is revealed only after you get your ticket. The concerts move from month to month between the smaller halls within the Konzerthaus.

Potsdam 2011: Celebrating the Silver Screen

2011-03-06T18:22:00.001+01:00

On 12 February 1912, the sound of the clapperboard rang for the first time through the Glasatelier (glass-roofed studio) -- Europe's oldest film studio at Babelsberg in Potsdam. Asta Nielsen, Europe's first leading lady, stepped forward for the first take of the (now lost) silent film Der Totentanz. This year, Potsdam celebrates that historic moment by declaring 2011 the Year of Film.

But wait a moment, you say, sharpening your keen powers of observation. Shouldn't the Year of Film then be 2012?

Ah, yes. Except that Potsdam is already gearing up for a huge celebration in 2012 -- the 300th birthday of Frederick II, Emperor of Prussia -- and two momentous occasions may be one too many. Besides, the foundation stone of the Babelsberg studios on the site of what was once a spinning and weaving factory, was actually laid in November 1911 -- thus giving Potsdam a reason to move up the celebration date.

Asta Nielsen in her Berlin apartment Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Bärbel Dalichow, head of Potsdam's Film Museum, is delighted that the city can finally draw attention to the star role it has played in European film history. "We are proud to look back on a 100-year history of moving pictures that have moved audiences everywhere," she says.

Babelsberg: the German Dream Factory
No other film studio is so bound up with a country's turbulent history -- cinematic, social, cultural and political. Babelsberg survived a monarchy, the Weimar Republic, the Nazi era and the Communist regime of the German Democratic Republic (GDR). Fritz Lang's monumental silent movie Metropolis was filmed here, as was Leni Riefenstahl's propagandist Triumph des Willens or Triumph of the Will (commissioned by Hitler), and Josef von Sternberg's Der Blaue Engel (The Blue Angel), starring Marlene Dietrich. The role of Lola-Lola rocketed Dietrich to international fame and a contract with Paramount Pictures.

From the end of the war till German reunification, Babelsberg was the GDR's film studio, the Deutsche Film AG -- or DEFA, as people still refer to it. During this time the prolific DEFA produced no fewer than 1,240 TV and feature films, including Jakob der Lügner (Jacob the Liar), the only GDR film nominated for an Oscar.

Since 2007, some of the big-name blockbusters have been filmed here: Stephen Daldry's The Reader, Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards, Roman Polanski's The Ghost Writer, and Roland Emmerich's Anonymous are just a few.

Potsdam 2011: the City of Film
One of the highlights of the year-long celebration is the "Agentennacht" (Night of the Secret Agents) on May 14. The studio, using special effects, recreates history on the Glienicker Brücke (also known as the Bridge of Spies) where US-occupied West Berlin exchanged captured spies with Soviet-occupied Potsdam during the Cold War.

May 21 is Open Day at the Babelsberg campus, where you can explore behind the scenes at all 16 studios, watch 3.000 film crew members at work, and gawk at elaborate props and collection of 250.000 costumes.

Get a unique perspective on Silver Screen history by joining one of Babelsberg's quirky walking tours. Between 16 April and 16 October, the 3-hour tour "Film Stars, Political Borders and the Stalin Villa" takes you into several fascinating homes and buildings connected with political and film history, including the residences of Truman, Churchill and Stalin during the Potsdam Conference (1945).

For more information on the 2011 Potsdam: Jahr des Films events, check their website.

C for Currywurst, E for Exportweltmeister

2011-02-13T13:06:00.002+01:00

Twenty-five million apple-cheeked garden gnomes grace our front yards; 95,000 new titles appear every year in our bookstores; 130 professional orchestras perform in our concert halls; and over 300 theaters are open every night for a stage production. Who knew?

You would, if you had stopped in at the small exhibition called "Deutschland für Anfänger" (Germany for Beginnners) at the Forum Willy Brandt on Unter den Linden. Arranged in a sequence that runs through 26 concepts, each representing a single letter in the alphabet, the exhibition is a romp through German history and culture -- informative (but never dry), imaginative, playful and interactive. Instead of shying away from cliches it presents them tongue-in-cheek.

Photo: with kind permission of the Goethe Institut

You'll learn the story behind Berlin's favorite fast food, the curry wurst, and discover why German soccer was never the same after the 1966 World Cup game in England's Wembley stadium. You can hear our eight principle dialects and hum along to versions of the Loreley legend in popular music. You can test your knowledge of the ten German winners of the Nobel Prize and watch archived material from the 1960s and 70s on the daily television news show, the Tagesschau.

Photo: with kind permission of bpb | copyright: Jan Konsitzki

Visitors to Berlin will enjoy this exhibition -- it's easily combined with a shopping spree on Unter den Linden, and convenient to reach as the S-Bahn Brandenburger Tor is at its doorstep -- but I guarantee that even long-time residents will be surprised by what they can discover by popping in. I bet they couldn't tell you where the first garden gnomes appeared, for instance (Thüringia, in 1872), and why. Drop in and find out!

Photo: with kind permission of bpb | copyright: Jan Konsitzki

"Deutschland für Anfänger" is at the Forum Willy Brandt, Unter den Linden 62-68, and runs till 27 February 2011. The exhibition is open from Tuesday to Sunday, 10 am to 6 pm, and entrance is free. Getting there: The Forum is located at the S Brandenburger Tor's exit on Unter den Linden.

The exhibition is organized by the Goethe Institut and the bpb (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung). In addition to the exhibition, there is an excellent documentary film on Willy Brandt, former German Chancellor, for whom the Forum is named.

C/O: Address Unknown

2011-01-25T21:42:00.002+01:00

C/O, one of Berlin's most unique art centers, will soon become an endangered species -- yet another space for the creative arts forced out by gentrification and soaring real-estate prices.

From Leibovitz to Lindbergh, Magnum to Mapplethorpe
The photo gallery on Oranienburgerstrasse opened in 2000 in the spectacular 19th century building which had once housed the postal office, the Postführamt -- from where the name C/O derives.

Photographer Stefan Erfurt stumbled on the empty building while looking for space in which to exhibit photographs from the Magnum agency archives. That was back in 2000. Over the next ten years, C/O became one of Berlin's top photo galleries. The exhibition of works by Annie Leibovitz in 2009 had viewers lining up around the block. The "On Street" exhibition featuring Peter Lindbergh opened last September but had so many visitors that it had to be extended by a week this January. And just last weekend began a brilliant retrospective of works by the legendary Robert Mapplethorpe.

Visual Dialogue
C/O showcases the work of photographers, architects and designers, and draws attention to nexus points between the three. One of the first talks in its lecture series was by star architect Daniel Libeskind in 2002. Lectures and workshops accompanying the exhibitions make C/O more than "just" a museum or gallery. Its dynamic team prefers to call it an "International Forum for Visual Dialogue."

photo: with kind permission of C/O Berlin

Curiosity, Passion and Professionalism
These three words are set off against the gallery's logo, and they describe to a T the team behind C/O's success: photographer Stephan Erfurt, designer Marc Naroska and architect Ingo Pott. Against incredible odds, they have kept the gallery running as a private enterprise, without the infusion of state funds. Instead, they have relied on their ingenuity, the ability to find creative solutions for financial crises, a vast network of contacts and sponsors, and a high volume of visitors (30.000 in its first year, 180.000 in its tenth).

Alas, curiosity and passion have been outdone by crass commercialism. The site has been purchased by an Israeli investment group, El-Ad, whose plans are to build a luxury hotel and shopping center. C/O faces eviction, come this Spring.

A Child of Mitte
Erfurt calls C/O a "child of Mitte," referring to the phenomenon in Berlin Mitte, where creative improvisation made arts centers out of unrenovated buildings, post-1989.

While the Postführamt has an imposing exterior, walk inside and you will find internationally acclaimed photographs mounted on walls of peeling and pock-marked plaster. The wallpaper is faded, and sculpted pillars are in a state of grand disrepair. The upstairs gallery space has obviously been converted from an old basketball court, and the hoop backboard still remains on the wall.

But the phrase also refers to a repeated pattern of gentrification in Berlin Mitte -- first a state of neglect and low rents, then the artists, then the tourists, then skyrocketing real-estate rates and commercial deals, which finally edge out the cultural institutions that made the district attractive in the first place.

This same pattern happened down the road from C/O where Tacheles, the former department store which became an arts squat, post-1989, housing a cinema, theater, bars and 30 artists' studios, has been taken over by HSH Nordbank. The new owner intends to sell the property for 35 million Euros. The building must be empty by the end of this month.

Restaurants and Pub Crawls
A plan to relocate C/O to the empty Jewish girls' school in the Gallery Quarter on Auguststraße in the Hackesche Höfe area proceeded for a while, raising hopes. Then, just before Christmas, the Jewish community announced that it was selling to the gallery owner, Michael Fuchs, instead. Fuch's commercial plans include gallery space as well as a branch of the restaurant Grill Royal.

Malls, five-star hotels and royal grills -- not exactly edgy -- and a far cry from the best of Berlin's alternative art scene."Once we move and Tacheles has closed ... Oranienburger Strasse will just be Indian restaurants and tourist pub crawls," says Erfurt.

The unconventional and unbureaucratic financial structure of C/O cannot survive without an attractive location. Unless the city moves fast to help secure new digs, the future of a unique cultural institution is at stake.

C/O Berlin is at Oranienburgerstr. 35-36 (S Oranienburgerstraße) and is open daily from 11 am to 8 pm. Entrance is 10 EUR (reduced rate: 5 EUR). See the C/O Berlin website for more details and for more on the Mapplethorpe exhibition, which runs from 22 January to 27 March 2011.

The Big "B"

2011-01-06T11:50:00.000+01:00

Watch out for the Big "B" as it appears in mid-January in locations around the city, beginning with Potsdamer Platz. The letter B, in toothpaste white, gleams against a red background, from the heart of which white rays fan out, creating the optical illusion of concentric circles like the twists of candy mints.

This is the new poster for the Berlinale 2011, Berlin's International Film Festival, and it's sure to catch your eye. The artwork was designed by the Boros Agency and harks back to poster art of the 1920s and 30s, the golden age of film. In fact, you can see the same design elements in an early 1930s poster for Scho-Ka-Kola, a popular Berlin chocolate company.

photo: copyright, Frank Vincentz (Wikimedia Commons)

The strobe-like effect, according to Boros, gives visual form to the festival's magnetic draw for talent from around the world.

Boros's concept has already been given the thumbs up by graphic designers and Berlin's avid festival fans, who like the reference to pre-war Berlin but also to the very contemporary flirtation with the Golden 20s. It completely overshadows last year's motif, which combined mint green and lilac blocks of color, painstakingly stitching the names of all 15.000 films showed in 60 years of the Berlinale into the title -- not exactly easy on the eye.

The Berlinale is a long-cherished institution. It opened with Alfred Hitchcock's "Rebecca" back in 1951, when Berlin was still struggling to emerge from the rubble and destruction of World War II. What makes it special is that, unlike Cannes, where tickets are available for invitees only, the Berlinale is a festival for all and has one of the largest film festival audiences in the world. This year, its 61st appearance, it runs from February 10-20 and features over 400 films from across the globe. Mark the dates on your calendar!

The Berlinale runs from February 10-20, 2011. The premiere film is the Coen brothers's "True Grit". Tickets run from 7-11 EUR and are available at the central ticket counter at the Arkaden shopping mall (Potsdamer Platz) or at various theater box offices (listed in the Festival catalog) but will also be available online. Students receive half-price tickets at the box office. See the Berlinale website for more details.

Christmas Eve at the Bode

2010-12-24T00:23:00.002+01:00

If you've had your fill of Christmas Markets and sloshing around banks of snow to get your mitts around some Glühwein or Bratwurst, you're probably ready for a change of pace on Christmas Eve.

This is the best day on which to visit one of Berlin's museums, a few of which -- like the Bode Museum at the Museum Island -- are open till 2 p.m. Finally, you will have the beautiful art and opulent interior spaces all to yourself. There couldn't be a better time than the morning of Christmas Eve to take in the Bode Museum's collection of Byzantine art, leaving the last-minute shoppers and madding crowd far behind.

photo: Gunnar Bach Pedersen/Wikimedia Commons

After that, you have time to stroll down Oranienburgerstrasse and later, to stop by the Sophienkirche, which has a live manger scene, beginning at 4.30 p.m., and a sacred music program at 6 p.m.

Merry Christmas!

See Spiegel Online's photo gallery on the Bode Museum here.

The Bode Museum is at the Musuem Island, on Am Kupfergraben 1. The nearest subway is S and U Friedrichstr. or Bus 100 or 200 (stop: Staatsoper).

The Sophienkirche is at Hackescher Markt, on Große Hamburgerstr. 29. The nearest subway is U Weinmeisterstr.

Film Festival Without Red Carpets

2010-12-03T01:49:00.003+01:00

Ever since he saw the comedy "Liebesgrüße vom Wörthersee " at age seventeen, Bernhard Karl was hooked on films. His early career years were spent as theater director in München, but his dream was to work for one of the major film festivals. He applied to the Berlinale but was turned down. "Why don't you create your own film festival?" asked one of his friends. That was the beginning of "Around the World in 14 Films," the film festival without red carpets.

Bernhard Karl is the founder of "Around the World in 14 Films," now taking place at the Kino Babylon in its fifth edition. Each year, Karl travels to ten festivals in 14 world regions, from Locarno to Toronto, from Cannes to Venice. He sees some 5000 films a year. Then he brings home a selection of his favorites for the broad public, mere unaccredited mortals who have no access to the top festivals in exotic locations.

This festival is like no other. Run on a shoestring budget, with help from supporters, sponsors and friends, its administrative team consists of Karl and his laptop. The screenings include no glamour, no popping flashbulbs, no red carpets. Just great films and avid cineasts.

Scene from "Curling," directed by Denis Côté (Canada)

Actually, avid and eternally grateful cineasts -- because many of these films will never make it to German movie houses. "The only films that are successful commercially, " sighs Karl, "are comedies or films about Hitler." That's exactly why "Around the World in 14 Films" fills a niche. It brings home some of the best films shown in world festivals and, at the same time, gives producers a brilliant opportunity to find a public for box-office non-starters.

One of the most interesting films this year (and Karl's personal favorite) is "Autobiografia Lui Nicolae Ceausescu, " a bio pic about the Romanian dictator. Director Andrei Ujica went through 1000 hours of footage to find material for this gem of a film.

Temperatures are sub-zero and the Berlinale isn't till February. See you at the Babylon this weekend?

"Around the World in 14 Films" runs from Friday, November 26 to Saturday, December 4 at Kino Babylon, Rosa-Luxemburg Strasse 30 (U Rosa-Luxemburg Platz).
The next screening of "Autobiografia Lui Nicolae Ceausescu, " is on Saturday, December 4, at 16:00.
For more details go to the Festival website.

Most Interesting Person

2010-12-01T10:47:00.002+01:00

Who is the most interesting person you know? Stuart Holt, British photographer, has been traveling to some of the world's metropolitan cities, asking this question.

Each person he films sends him to somebody he or she finds most interesting, who then becomes the next stop on Holt's filmic journey. This domino reaction continues till, finally, Holt has created what he calls a trail -- a linked sequence of short films, featuring ordinary people who talk about their passions, convictions and personal heroes. Each "most interesting person" also chooses the location for the conversation. Long Trail Film Making, says Holt, is a great way to get "behind the skin" of a throbbing metropolis.

Stuart Holt started the project in London, continuing on to New York, Los Angeles, Sao Paulo and Tel Aviv. For the past year he has been in Berlin, and recently, he presented his series of short films in the Ballhaus Ost. The Berlin trails -- four in all -- are fascinating portraits of the people behind the creative energy of this city. Berlin's Trail Four, for instance, begins with Jetta Miller, film producer and director, who talks to Holt in her apartment in Berlin Mitte.

From Jetta Miller, the trail moves on to Rebecca Bach, video and performance artist. Bach chooses the Plänterwald as the environment in which to talk about her video project, "Wo sind Sie überhaupt?", an exploration of Berlin on foot along a single axis that cuts through the city. Bach's personal hero is Thorsten Schmitz, journalist for the Süddeutsche Zeitung. Schmitz talks quietly about reporting in conflict zones while he walks through the Pfaueninsel, a natural surrounding which, in his words, allows you to listen to silence and simply "be."

Schmitz's most interesting person is Edda Kruse Rosset, student, who talks to us from the place that is most significant for her: the "magic rooftops" above her house in Kreuzberg, one of the empty buildings that were occupied by squatters in the 1980s. Rosset points us to Beanne da Costa, also a student. Eighteen-year-old da Costa takes us through the park in Friedrichshain, and in the sun-dappled light slanting through trees, she shares with us her conviction of the power of music. In this delightful clip, she sings, narrates and dissolves into peals of laughter whenever she cannot take herself too seriously.

I asked Holt if the Berlin sequence was different from the others. Very much so, said Holt. The most interesting persons in London or Los Angeles, for instance, tended to be those who could further the careers of others. The choices of Berliners were more honest, varied and unpredictable. This city is a cultural ground zero, said Holt, which makes the Berlin stories that much richer.

Holt's sequences of three-minute-long portraits are spot on: a snapshot of Berlin 2010. Take a look at this "under the skin" perspective of the city on the Most Interesting Person website. And keep an eye open just in case this talented photographer/filmmaker happens to be following a trail in your city!

Discovery: Degenerate Art Under Rubble

2010-11-12T18:13:00.001+01:00

They have spent more time under rubble than in a museum -- eleven sculptures that were confiscated as "degenerate art" from museums across Germany by the Nazi propaganda action.

The early-twentieth-century sculptures were part of a traveling exhibition of degenerate art in 1937, shown to the public as examples of art that disgraced the national spirit. They were returned to the Nazi Propaganda Ministry in 1941, then disappeared without a trace -- believed to be destroyed, sold or stolen.

"Small Miracle"
Berlin's mayor, Klaus Wowereit, called their discovery a "small miracle." Recently, construction work for the U5 subway line opposite Berlin's City Hall had turned up objects from the city's medieval past, including remnants of the original city hall from 1290. This brought archaeologists to the site.

To their surprise, they made an even bigger discovery: eleven delicate sculptures in bronze and terracotta, still bearing traces of fire bombing and destruction, buried deep within the rubble of a bombed-out cellar on Königstrasse 50.

Photo: Reuters

How Did They Get There?

Nobody knows for sure, but we do know that Königstrasse was located in a bustling city center in pre-war Berlin, and one of the offices in Number 50 belonged to a public accountant, Erhard Oewerdieck, and his wife Charlotte, who offered protection to Jewish intellectual friends during the Nazi persecution. They helped several flee the country, storing for them their collections of books and correspondence. Were these sculptures also part of a persecuted friend's collection?

Photo: AFP

Quiet Beauty in Terracotta

The fragment of the expressionist figure "Schwangere"("Pregnant Woman," 1918) by Emy Roeder is one of the most moving artworks recovered from the rubble. The figure is heart-rendingly fragile, the full lips and elongated cheekbones still bearing the blackened marks of fire destruction. But at the same time, we see strength and endurance in her downward gaze and the way she seems to concentrate on her inner self.

For Berlin's "small miracle" there could be no better exhibition space than Berlin's Neues Museum, itself a building that combines the enduring quality of architectural beauty with the deep scars of war and destruction.

Ten of the eleven sculptures are on display at the Neues Museum, located on the Museum Island, Bodestraße 3, 10178 Berlin. Public transportation options include: S-Bahn to Hackescher Markt, tram M4, M5, M6 to Hackescher Markt, Bus 100, 200 to Lustgarten.

The museum is open from 10:00 am to 6 pm, Monday to Wednesday, and 10 am to 8 pm, Thursday to Sunday. Admission is 10 EUR. Avoid queues by purchasing a"time-slot ticket" in advance.

Das Kochhaus: Tante Emma with a Twist

2010-10-30T08:51:00.002+02:00

A new kind of grocery store opened last month in Berlin-Schöneberg -- a store that makes you feel you are walking into a Nigella Lawson cookbook.

That's exactly the experience that Ramin Goo, the under-30 founder of Das Kochhaus, wants you to have (except, perhaps, for the Nigella Lawson bit).

Guess Who's Making Dinner
Goo knows from personal experience the frustration of returning home from work (he was a management consultant at McKinsey) and trying to make an inspired menu from weary-looking veggies at the back of the fridge. Neither did he feel like trawling through supermarket aisles, filling a grocery cart with random items. People needed an alternative, he decided. And it wasn't take-out.

The joy of cooking at home, says Goo, begins with the pleasure of shopping for food. That's why his store is not organized according to categories of produce but instead visualizes the process of reading (and being inspired by) an illustrated cookbook.

photo: courtesy, Das Kochhaus

Shopping by Storyboards
Each week, Goo and his team create recipes that combine seasonal freshness, creativity and simple elegance. Then they stock the store for that week according to the recipes.

photo: courtesy, Das Kochhaus

The aesthetic of the store is Zen-like. There are 20 tables and above each, a display poster in blackboard style, illustrating a recipe. The ingredients are on the table, carefully measured for two, four or six, arranged as beautifully and symmetrically as in a Japanese bento box.

photo: courtesy, Das Kochhaus

The store itself is laid out as a kind of dinner storyboard. You move from the appetizer tables to the salad variations, on to the entrees, and finally, the dessert. Recommended wines are on each table, as are kitchen tools called for by a specific recipe: a nutmeg grater here, a garlic press there. No detail has been overlooked.

A New Kind of Tante Emma
When Goo first broached the idea to investors, it was met with skepticism. A start-up project with fruits and vegetables instead of the internet? Not exactly cutting-edge.

But Goo's idea has caught on. While the average supermarket has about 15,000 items, Das Kochhaus has around 500. On the one hand, it is a throwback to the Tante Emma Laden of the 1970s (pre-supermarket), the little family-run shop where you could stock up on kitchen, pantry and domestic needs in one stop. On the other, Das Kochhaus fast-forwards Tante Emma into the twenty-first century.

Personally, I prefer the chaotic shopping you tend to do in the weekly farmers' markets (where you pick up two kilos of porcini mushrooms, then concoct recipes around the reckless purchase), and I warm to the kitchen that never runs out of cinnamon or turmeric rather than one that sports tidy packages of three red chillies, two stalks of parsley and one clove of garlic. But then, that's just me.

Das Kochhaus was bustling with customers yesterday. Couples stood in front of the tables, discussing dinner possibilities. Should it be the pasta with shiitake mushrooms and diced ham in a rosemary sauce this evening, or would they dare to try the lentil and lychee curry?

Goo's team, creators of the world's first walk-in cookbook, is already thinking of introducing cooking classes and expanding into other parts of Berlin and other cities in Germany.

For more information, photos, videos, press clippings (Das Kochhaus has extensive local, national and international press coverage) and the week's recipes, go to www.kochhaus.de. Recipe ingredients cost anywhere from 2,70 EUR per person to 9,50 EUR per person, and the package includes a recipe leaflet to take home.

Das Kochhaus is open Mondays to Fridays, from 10:00 am to 09:00 pm, and on Saturdays from 09:00 am to 08:00 pm. It is located at Akazienstrasse 1 in Berlin-Schöneberg, at the corner of Akazienstrasse and Hauptstrasse. The nearest U-Bahn station in U Eisenachstr. (U7). Buses M48 and M85 have stops right outside the entrance.

Bach in Schöneberg, Free Jazz in Friedrichshain

2010-10-22T13:04:00.008+02:00

Piano City Berlin is on this weekend, a music festival that takes place in living rooms rather than in concert halls. The festival is an initiative of Radialsystem V, the cultural centre that calls itself "a new space for the arts in Berlin," and it invites listeners to piano concerts in private homes. The performers are not concert pianists. They just might be your neighbors.

It all began with a concert at the German-Finnish Society in Turku in southwestern Finland, in April 2009. After the concert, pianist Andreas Kern met up with three other guest performers in a cafe. They talked about the loneliness of the professional pianist. Unlike musicians in an ensemble or an orchestra, the pianist spends hours alone with his instrument. But what if you made the experience less solitary, if only for a day -- or a weekend?

There must be several hundreds of pianists in Berlin who had something to offer an audience, Kern thought -- students at the music conservatories such as the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler or the Universität der Künste, those who taught music or played for pleasure. He was right. When he created a website inviting Berliners to send in videos of their performance and their reasons for wanting to be part of Piano City, he got hundreds of responses from professionals, amateurs, and shades of in-between -- Berliners from all walks of life, all ages, playing everything from classical to standard and free jazz to original compositions. They had one thing in common: they were passionate about the piano.

photo: Kitty Kleist-Heinrich

Sophia Grevesmühl, music professional who studied at the Universität der Künste, was one of the first to send in her video to Kern's web site, and this weekend she will be performing Brahms in her Kreuzberg apartment, crammed with her favorite books and ficus house plants. Her sofa and kitchen chairs will be the "concert hall," and she plans to add a homey touch with tea and cookies. Sophia likes the idea of playing for people she has never seen before and being able to chat with them later. What brings them to my concert of all those featured in the program, she wants to know.

If you cringe at the thought of hearing one more amateur rendition of Bach's Prelude in C, this might not be for you. But if you like the idea of getting to know ordinary Berliners, some of whom have extraordinary talent, and traipsing through their living rooms (the smallest takes no more than eight guests) while listening to Prokofiev and free jazz, the weekend holds promise.

Piano City Berlin features 70 Berlin pianists and takes place on Saturday, October 23 and Sunday, October 24. Tickets (5.35 EUR) are available only at the festival website at www.pianocity-berlin.com
where you can also view videos of the pianists. The exact address is available only after you make the purchase (although the listing does specify the city district).

Piano City is followed by Musik in den Häusern der Stadt (Music in City Homes), which takes place all over Germany, from November 2 to 7, and features a range of instruments. There will be 19 concerts in Berlin. See www.kunstsalon.de for more information.

Art not just in Galleries

2010-10-09T19:24:00.000+02:00

The Art Forum Berlin is on this weekend: the fifteenth edition of the international art show, featuring contemporary painting, sculpture, photography, video art and installations from 130 galleries from around the world. And, as so often in Berlin, the international event is accompanied by local satellite events. This weekend, there are at least three.

The Big Draw
The inspiration for the Big Draw festival comes from the Campaign for Drawing, a charity organization in England, whose ambition is to get people to lose their inhibitions about picking up a drawing pencil and to use it as a tool for thought, creativity and social engagement.

The first Big Draw in Berlin was held in 2009, during the Long Night of the Museums. This year, festival director Anna Chrusciel has gone a step further, transforming more public spaces into art studios for all -- including the Deutsche Bank's atrium off Unter den Linden and the Grüner Salon at Rosa-Luxemberg Platz. Berliners of all ages can be seen in galleries, cafes, U-Bahn stations, even the Botanical Gardens, recklessly wielding sketching pencils, felt pens, highlighter markers, post-it notes, clay, scissors and glue.

Artists lead workshops where you can experiment with working on an animated film, comic strip or poster ad. Fun!

A Taste of Grunge

The Score .03 urban art fair is on all weekend, next to the U-Bahn Gleisdreieck. Its profile piqued my curiosity -- a combination of live painting, street art and graffiti. Berlin has some great street art, if you know where to look for it -- or know people who do -- (my best guides have been a couple of intrepid freshmen students), but this festival tries too hard to be edgy to be genuinely interesting. Not recommended if you don't lean toward techno music and grunge appeal.

Art in the Hangars
Preview Berlin, an exhibition of works from 60 galleries in 19 countries, takes place in the light-filled, freshly painted Hangar 2 of Tempelhof Airport. Use of this space to showcase young gallery-owners without large-scale resources -- including several from eastern and central Europe -- and artists not yet established in the art world is a stroke of genius.

All three events are on till 10 October 2010. For more information, see:
www.thebigdrawberlin.de
www.stroke03.com
www.previewberlin.de

Figaro is Moving In

2010-10-04T23:38:00.002+02:00

Yesterday, after almost two years of renovation, and an investment of 23 million Euros, the newly refurbished Schiller Theater opened its doors as interim housing for the Staatsoper, Berlin's State Opera House on Unter den Linden. There is a sweet ironic twist to the turn of events.

Last Night at the Schiller
The Schiller Theater had been the leading light among West Berlin theaters in the 1950s and 60s. Samuel Beckett himself directed a production of Waiting for Godot here in 1975. But after reunification in 1989, Berlin ended up with more cultural institutions than any other German city, and state funds could not support them all. Two theaters from former east Berlin, the Deutsches Theater and the Volksbühne, made the final cut, but the Schiller Theater had to go.

Berliners still remember the firestorm of protest, the demonstrations, the historic Long Night of the Artists -- a final defiant marathon performance lasting through the night -- and then, the closing in late September 1993.

photo: dpa

Now, exactly 17 years later, and in time for the 20th anniversary of German Unification, a newly gleaming Schiller Theater reopens in the west, and the famous opera house from former east Berlin moves in. The Staatsoper, undergoing a major three-year renovation, is using the Schiller Theater as its temporary home till 2013. Daniel Barenboim, its music director, called it the reunification made complete.

Figaro is Moving In
Figaro is Moving In is the name of a special guided tour offered by the Schiller Theater during the season's opening days. It takes visitors not only through the building but also to production cast members as they get ready for a performance. Tickets for the tour sold out almost immediately, but although you may have missed it, you can still take the regular guided tour, which offers fascinating glimpses of the restoration work required to make a 1950s theater for dramatic productions suitable for a twenty-first century opera house.

The 1950s design elements are still there: wall frescoes, copper embellishments, Murano-glass ceiling lights, iridiscent mosaic in the foyer's front window. The old 1950s cafeteria lies untouched and even the pastel tones of carpets have been retained. But layers of black paint have been stripped from the walls facing the stage, exposing original warm maple wood panels, front row seats have been ripped out to carve out space for an orchestra pit that can take 120 musicians, and engineers have doubled the resonance in the hall (from 0.9 to almost 2.0 seconds). Take the tour to find out more!

Sleepless in Charlottenburg
There is also a series of night tours that takes place after a performance, and a late-night music and literary series (accompanied by champagne) in the foyer called "Sleepless in Charlottenburg". You don't have to be an opera buff to enjoy the Schiller Theater this season.

For more information, dates and times of the tours, go to the Staatsoper in the Schiller Theater website.
Tours cost 5 EUR (regular price). Tours are in German only.
The Sleepless in Charlottenburg series starts in November and begins at 10:30 pm. Tickets are 15 EUR (regular price).

The Schiller Theater is at Bismarckstrasse 110, 10625 Berlin. The nearest subway is U Ernst-Reuter Platz.

Bauhaus by Bike

2010-09-10T23:32:00.001+02:00

You've seen them often: Berlin tourists-on-bikes pedalling determinedly across Potsdamer Platz, sailing down Unter den Linden or whizzing along the East Side Gallery. But, far from the madding crowd, is a 90-minute bike tour with a difference.

This is the tour I mentioned in my last blog, and it's one that fewer tourists discover. The combined bike/audio guide tour starts from the Haus am Waldsee, then traces a path through the leafy villa colony of Zehlendorf, taking you past 12 private homes designed by Bauhaus artists Walter Gropius, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Hermann Muthesius.

photo: Viola F. Ording

The route loops around the beautiful Schlachtensee lake, and the concentration of 1920s Bauhaus homes in this residential neighborhood makes it unique in all of Germany. Some have the romantic charm of English country homes; others have the strict functional lines we associate with purist Bauhaus.

The tour was designed by Katja Blomberg, curator of the Haus am Waldsee, who was inspired by a walking/audio guide tour through a residential neighborhood in Chicago, studded with homes designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Blomberg liked the unpretentious tone of the Chicago audio guide and decided that was exactly what she needed for her Zehlendorf Bauhaus tour. The research and commentary were prepared with the help of students from the Universität der Künste.

An ideal combination of city biking, nature, history and architecture. Nothing spells "Serene Weekend" quite like it.

The Haus am Waldsee is at Argentinsiche Allee 30 (U3 to Krumme Lanke). You can either bring your own bike or rent one at the museum. Rentals are daily from 11 am to 4 pm and cost 5 EUR for two hours. The audio guide is available only in German.

Listen to the Water Grass: Berlin's Haus am Waldsee

2010-09-03T16:31:00.033+02:00

At the Haus am Waldsee, you never quite know which of the natural and man-made objects in the garden are actually the work of an artist's imagination. Take for instance the reeds and rushes at the water's edge. When their stalks rustle in the breeze, the whispering sound in the stillness is like the opening bars of a piece of music. Nature's magnum opus? Not quite. The tall grasses were planted by Austrian composer, Peter Ablinger, one of the international artists this museum has featured.

The Haus am Waldsee has been one of my most treasured finds this season. Like many Berliners, I had completely overlooked the 1920s grey villa while biking past it numerous times in hot summers, headed toward the Schlachtensee for a dip in the lake.

Far from the star attractions in the Museumsinsel in Berlin Mitte or the Kulturforum at Potsdamer Platz, the Haus am Waldsee basks in quiet seclusion at the edge of the Grunewald forest, waiting to be discovered.

Originally a private villa, the museum was one of the first to exhibit "degenerate art" after the collapse of the Third Reich. One of its earliest exhibitions (in 1946, when Berlin was still in ruins) was dedicated to the work of Käthe Kollwitz. Around that time, the first performance of the Berlin Philharmonic after the war's end took place here. Today, the Haus am Waldsee is a premier exhibition space for international contemporary artists, designers, musicians and writers.

photo copyright: Pablo Sanz Almoguera

When I visited yesterday, the museum was getting ready for the next exhibition beginning September 10, so there were no visitors -- a perfect opportunity to have the idyllic sculpture garden behind the villa all to myself. The garden is a 10.000 square-meter tree-shaded park that meanders to the Waldsee lake shore.

One of the coolest exhibits in the sculpture garden is the LoftCube. The vision of Berlin-based designer Werner Aisslinger, the Loftcube is the prototype of a "flying building," which can be lowered by helicopter on to tall building rooftops. If Berlin were to one day look like Tokyo, this would be ideal for urban nomads with a passion for minimalism.

I tried to imagine moving in to the LoftCube in the sculpture garden of the Haus am Waldsee -- surrounded by oaks and pines, looking out at the lake, the whispering reeds for company. Sort of like living in a designer treehouse. Not bad on a sun-dappled September day.

photo copyright: Pablo Sanz Almoguera

Stay tuned for my next post on an architectural bike tour you can plan, starting from the Haus am Waldsee.

The Haus am Waldsee is at Argentinische Allee 30, 14163 Berlin. Take U3 to Krumme Lanke, walk south on Argentinische Allee, about 5 minutes. Open, Tuesday to Sunday, 11:00-18:00, Wednesday from 11:00-20:00. Closed on Monday. Entrance to the exhibition is 5 EUR. You don't have to be an art-lover to enjoy the cafe's outdoor seating in the sculpture garden -- it's absolutely delightful.

Hidden Beauty: Nature Park in Schöneberg

2010-08-25T16:24:00.002+02:00

My last blog mentioned a nature park in the Schöneberg district, and I promised to tell you why it is one of Berlin's hidden gems. The Natur-Park Schöneberger Südgelände will not show up in a Lonely Planet guide or a travel site's Top Ten Berlin attractions, but this woodland area in an uncompromisingly urban landscape -- a former railway switchyard -- is pure magic.

Nothing prepares you for the 18-hectare expanse of wilderness at the southern end of the Priesterweg S-Bahn station. Neither "preserved" nor landscaped, the park evolved when nature stepped in and took the upper hand.

Steel Rails
Native flora and fauna were wiped out when construction of the Tempelhof railway switchyard began in the 1890s. Over the next decades, this became one of Berlin's busiest rail hubs and, by the time of the Second World War, a crucial center for transporting war materials. By the late 1940s, the outcome of the war (and later, the Berlin blockade) made the switchyard obsolete. Rail operations finally ground to a halt in 1952. The area became a ghost installation, steel tracks cutting through the land, going nowhere.

Berlin Biotope
Then, silently, Nature reasserted itself. A natural forest grew up, undisturbed by men and machines. Native birch and lime trees, common oaks and Norway maples put down roots between the tracks. Fruit trees marched across the desolate space, and wild roses sprawled across rusting rails. Dry meadows burst into bloom with evening primrose, white wild carrots and sickleweed. Nightingales, robins and blackcaps moved back into their terrain, as did wild bees, crickets and blue-winged grasshoppers. A perfect, miniature biotope flourished in what was once the busiest railway site in Berlin.

photo: Holger Koppatsch

Railway Tracks through the Wilderness

A steam engine, now surrounded by birch trees, stands witness to the park's history as does the original 1927 water tower. The longest route through the park is 2.7 kms., and when I take it, I feel like a child exploring a secret garden. Don't miss out on walking along a 600 m. long steel-mesh platform raised above the original track bed. Nature lovers find themselves following a path through the wilderness once taken by the steam railways that supplanted it. The experience is unique.

The Nature Park Schönegerger Südgelände was first opened to the public in 2000, generously funded by the Allianz Environmental Foundation, and was declared a Global Project of EXPO 2000. The main entrance to the park is at the southern exit of the Priesterweg S-Bahn station, which you can reach on lines S2 and S25. Opening hours are from 9 a.m. till nightfall. Admission is 1 EUR. Open all year round, and beautiful in any season. Highly recommended: a visit in Fall.

Concerts in the Park

2010-08-12T21:11:00.025+02:00

August is the best month for concerts in the park. The sweltering heat of July is over, the last weeks of vacation are still on, and there are at least four weeks to go before theaters and concert halls open again for the new season. Outdoor summer performances remind us that Berlin is gritty but green.

Since I was away on vacation, I missed a large part of the Wassermusik 2010 Festival at the Haus der Kulturen der Welt, but I am still in time for the Parks in Concert series (20-29 August), including open-air performances in the Botanische Garten, Schloss Charlottenburg, Britzer Garten, Kulturbrauerei and Schloss Köpenick.

My tip for August-October is the Acoustic Concerts Berlin, a small, unplugged summer concert series that showcases local talent. Concerts are held in intimate settings: this year, the Alte Bahnhofshalle Friedenau, the beautifully restored, historic railway station at S-Bahnhof Friedenau (dating back to 1874), and the Natur-Park Schöneberger Südgelände, one of Berlin's most unique (but still relatively little-known) nature parks.

I only discovered the park this spring, after having lived just three stops away for many years. It has a fantastic history, so I'll save it for my next post.

Tomorrow (August 13, at 19:30) San Francisco- born Shannon Callahan will be performing at the nature park with her band (guitar/vocals/bass/drums). Callahan has a background in opera and musical theater, but the music she records and performs now is purely acoustic: a mix of folk, pop, country and soul.

Whether or not you make it to the concert tomorrow evening, stay tuned for more on the nature park Schöneberger Südgelände in my next blog to find out why it is one of Berlin's hidden gems.

Shakespeare in the Park

2010-07-21T19:41:00.002+02:00

A few weeks ago I blogged about the latest twist in the story of the Stadtschloss. In the wake of the announcement that Berlin's Schlossplatz will remain empty till at least 2014, the earliest date when work on the new Humboldtforum can begin, came ingenious proposals for using the space in the meantime.

Enter the Shakespeare Company, a Berlin theater group with one of the most creative ideas that have come up. The group is lobbying to bring a replica of the historic Globe Theater to the Schlossplatz. "We have the theater, we have the team, we have the concept, and we have the space. All we need now is the permission," says Christian Leonard, the group's artistic director.

The idea is not as far-fetched as it might seem. A replica of the Globe Theater is already waiting in the wings. Set designers at the Babelsburg studios created it for the new film "Anonymous," shot just weeks ago, starring Vanessa Redrave and Rhys Ifans, and directed by Roland Emmerich (remember "Independence Day"?)

The Shakespeare Company's idea is a three-season run, from 2011-2013. Since the replica, seating about 750 people, is already complete and needs only to be dismantled, transported from Babelsburg, then reassembled, costs should not exceed a million EUR. The group will not expect public funding; they believe they can raise sufficient funds from sponsors and supporters. They could set the ball rolling with an opening production in the studios as early as September.

The idea of combining a reproduction of the venerable London theater with the popular New York summer tradition of Shakespeare in the Park and bringing it to the site of Berlin's Stadtschloss is nothing short of brilliant. I'm rooting for the Shakespeare Company!

Pictures are Souls

2010-07-05T00:22:00.000+02:00

"I don't have any pictures of me as a child, nor of my parents: nothing that can remind me of my childhood," says Saudi Arabian artist Ahmed Mater. "To take a picture was considered to be against religion. People thought pictures were souls."

Grey Borders
Mater and eleven other young artists from Saudi Arabia are presenting their work -- photographs, videos, drawings and installations -- in an exhibition called Grey Borders/Grey Frontiers, part of the sixth Berlin Biennale. There are two good reasons to stop by: one, this is the first exhibition of contemporary art from Saudi Arabia ever held in Germany; and two, it gives us a chance to poke around the newly opened Soho House, Berlin.

We are faceless
Organized by "Edge of Arabia," a grassroots initiative founded by British and Saudi artists, the exhibition challenges powerful cultural taboos. Images are deeply suspect in Saudi Arabia -- many are banned, others scrutinized and sanitized. There are practically no galleries, museums or art books, and its capital Riad, with four million inhabitants, has nary a cinema house. Jowhara Alsaud's series of line drawings entitled "Out of Line" applies the language of censorship to her personal photographs. In the pop-art style drawings derived from photographs, Alsaud erases all facial features. "We don't know how to deal with photographs in Saudi Arabia, " she says. "Of course, we all keep pictures of family and friends at home, but when we go outdoors, we are faceless."

The Soho House

While at the exhibition, take time to explore the Soho House, Berlin, modeled on the exclusive establishments in London's Soho and New York's Manhattan districts.

The building on Torstrasse 1 (Berlin, Mitte) was a Jewish-owned department store in the 1920s. Seized by the Nazis, it was converted into the headquarters of the Hitler Youth in the early 1940s. Renamed the House of Unity in postwar Berlin, it served as the seat of the East German Communist party from 1946-56, and later housed the East German Communist archives. For the past twelve years it has remained empty and in a state of rampant decay.

Now the owners of Soho House, London, have converted Torstrasse 1 into a swanky members-only hotel, retaining striking Communist-era features: the concrete, industrial look, metal staircase and metal filing cabinets in the reception area. Don't miss the Damien Hirst artwork on the wall, which you might mistake for graffiti if you overlook the scrawling signature.

"Grey Borders/Grey Frontiers" is at Soho House, Torstrasse 1, Berlin (U Bahnhof, Rosenthaler Platz). and is open from Tuesday to Sunday, 10:00-18:00. Entrance is free. The exhibition runs till July 18. More information is at www.edgeofarabia.com

For information about Soho House, go to www.sohohouseberlin.com

Castle in the Air

2010-06-19T01:21:00.004+02:00

First, Berlin's Palace Bellevue lost its prince -- President Horst Köhler, who resigned in a huff -- and now the city has lost its Palace. The reconstruction of the baroque Stadtschloß was to begin in 2011. But the government's latest austerity measures have shelved plans for one of Germany's most high-flying cultural projects.

Bombed and burned out after the war, the original palace was demolished by the GDR and replaced by the Palace of the Republic, a Stalinist rectangular box with bronze reflective glass.

After the discovery in 1990 of asbestos contamination, the bronze glass box stood closed and sealed for the next few years. Some hated it; some loved it. But in 1993 it was finally decided that the Palace of the Republic had to go -- as much for its historical symbolism as for the asbestos.

Then began the palace debate. What was the best way forward? Keep the GDR Palace after all, for the sake of nostalgia? (After all, how many parliamentary buildings also housed a bowling alley for the people!) Reconstruct the baroque palace, even though the result might be suspiciously close to kitsch? Wipe the slate clean and start anew?

After years of bitter wrangling, a concept for the Humboldt Forum -- a center for the arts and sciences -- was finally approved. Blueprints showed a historical facade replicating three sides of the original palace, but the Forum was unmistakably 21st-century in design and purpose. It would house part of the Humboldt University's Library, as well as the prized collection of non-European art from the Ethnological Museum in Dahlem. This was Berlin's answer to the 21st century museums in Abu Dhabi and Qatar or Aga Khan's museum opening this Fall in Toronto, Canada. All this came with a price tag of 552 million Euros.

But this is no time for big spending, says the government, freezing construction for at least three years. The mayor is incensed. The director of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation is wary, fearing that plans may be put into cold storage indefinitely. Financiers are critical, saying they see no real savings, given the huge cost of now renovating the Dahlem museum, which is in a dismal state of disrepair.

And the Berliners? They are used to temporality. Eighty percent of them did not believe we needed another palace anyway. And now that summer is finally, finally here, they can't believe their luck: they've just got 18,000 square meters of grassy meadow in the city's historic center with a view of the River Spree and the Lustgarten in which to lounge in their deck chairs. Let the summer roll on!

photo: Mike Wolff

Adieu, Maestro

2010-05-29T14:57:00.003+02:00

Ingo Metzmacher, the dynamic conductor of Berlin's Deutsches Symphonie Orchester (DSO) will be making his last appearance with the orchestra this June. After a stormy showdown with the orchestra's four shareholders last year, Metzmacher made a surprise announcement of his departure. Even now, a year later, you can hear the anger and frustration in his voice on the rare occasions on which he speaks publicly about his decision.

photo: copyright, Mathias Bothor

The strong bond between Metzmacher and his orchestra is so palpable in a live performance it can make your skin tingle. The DSO has had great conductors before (Kent Nagano was the last), but Metzmacher, the young orchestra's first German conductor, has done the most to bring novel ideas into the concert hall. He offers fresh, intriguing programming (one season was devoted to a musical exploration of "the German Soul"), and his trademark Casual Concerts are almost always sold out. At Casual Concerts orchestra members perform in jeans and T-Shirts, and Metzmacher often interrupts them to address the audience, mixing musical analysis and historical perspective with flashes of wry humor. All seats go for a flat 15 Euro, giving the audience profile a shake-up.

A year ago, it seemed as though nothing could stop the DSO and Ingo Metzmacher: they were on a roll. What happened next shows how closely -- and sometimes, disastrously -- politics, business and culture are interlinked in Berlin.

The four shareholders, including two public radio stations, the city of Berlin and the federal government, agreed to an additional subsidy of six million Euros from 2010-12 for the ROC (Rundfunkorchester und-chöre), the four-member ensemble to which the DSO is tied. Now, this level of public financial support for music is extraordinary for most parts of the world. Just ask any leading American orchestra.

The conditions attached to the subsidy, however, were unpalatable for Metzmacher. A disproportionate chunk went to the second orchestra in the ensemble, the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin (RSB), although last year's numbers show that the DSO pulled in twice as many concertgoers and raised twice the amount of revenue. While the RSB was allowed to expand, positions in the DSO (114 requested) were frozen at 103. Just last season, the orchestra lost three prized members to orchestras in Leipzig, Vienna and Munich, which could offer more secure and better paid positions.

The shadow of the Wall falls across the negotiations: in divided Berlin, the DSO was the RIAS Orchestra, (Rundfunk im amerikanischen Sektor), the leading orchestra in the West. And, yes, you might have guessed -- its arch rival, the RSB, was East Berlin's top orchestra.

The show must go on. DSO will perform with guest conductors till they find the right man for the job, and season ticket-holders will probably remain true in Fall 2010. But Metzmacher's departure will recalibrate the sound of this vibrant, young orchestra, and the competition with Berlin's six other major orchestras will be tougher than ever. Adieu, maestro. You -- and the DSO -- deserved better.

photo: copyright, Mathias Bothor

Ingo Metzmacher's final performance with the DSO in Berlin will be on Monday, June 14, at 20:00, at the Philharmonie, Berlin. The DSO, with Ingo Metzmacher, then launches into its busy summer schedule, performing in several European cities including London, at the BBC Proms. For more information go to www.dso-berlin.de

A Memorial in our Midst

2010-05-15T18:44:00.000+02:00

Berlin commemorated the fifth anniversary of the Holocaust Memorial this past week, honoring initiator Lea Rosh and architect Peter Eisenman, who had flown in from NewYork for the occasion. The Holocaust Memorial is now one of the most visited sites in Berlin: over the past five years, visitors have numbered about two and a half million for the underground museum alone, and at least eight million for Eisenman's Stelenfeld (Field of Steles).

photo: copyright, Mike Wolff

Eisenman's design for the memorial consists of 2711 slabs of grey concrete that become a dynamic labyrinth because of their varying heights, and axes that run both horizontally and vertically. Covering almost 20.000 square meters, the long, narrow passages between the slabs are claustrophobic spaces one moment, and entranceways to a widening vista the next.

The memorial's location -- in the heart of the city, near the former site of Hitler's Chancellery -- was the subject of a long, heated debate. Planners struggled with the question whether it was appropriate to place a holocaust memorial in a central open space without any enclosures, open to the public all 24 hours, and amid the banalities of urban life -- including a stand selling bratwurst on its periphery.

Five years on, even its once harshest critics recognize that the concept has been extraordinarily successful. Eisenman's Stelenfeld is impressive exactly because it is both a memorial to a haunting past and an integral part of Berlin's daily life -- exactly as the architect had envisioned.

photo: copyright, Mike Wolff

Walking through the stone labyrinth can be an emotional experience. This is a somber landscape that prompts reflection, and, deep in the labyrinth, you can suddenly feel alone in the midst of a large city. And yet this is not a museum to a fossilized past, nor is it a graveyard. Just when you feel the concrete slabs closing in on you, a child skips through a gap in the stones or a pedestrian stretches out briefly on one of the the sun-warmed flat surfaces.

In a city of memorials, this is perhaps the one that best reflects the character of Berlin. It is a memorial in our midst. You may find a school class working busily on a project. The person who lays a rose on one of the slabs may be a tourist or a holocaust survivor. There is no denying the depth of memory here, or the quiet dignity of the site. But there is no forced solemnity; people can be themselves. They can pose for a photograph, steal a kiss or risk a leap from stone to stone. Even the bratwurst stand has the right to remain.

'Kulturstadt' with a Heart

2010-05-01T12:24:00.006+02:00

On April 26 a remarkable new initiative in Berlin called Kulturloge kicked off. Brainchild of Angela Meyenburg, Kulturloge opens doors to cultural performances for those who cannot afford an evening at the theater, opera or concert hall.

The idea is a simple one. On the one hand, theaters and concert houses often have unsold tickets on performance night. On the other, those tickets represent the answer to a great need felt by Berliners on social welfare or in dire economic straits. Brief excursions into the city's cultural life can help lift them out of their isolation, stimulate their imagination and renew faith in themselves.

The Berlin Pass
Berlin is already very open to the idea of making culture available to all. The Berlin Pass, issued by the Senate, allows social welfare recipients to purchase available tickets for no more than three Euros -- a fantastic opportunity afforded to the weakest economic groups.

Tickets, please
But Kulturloge betters this deal because their members (or "guests") are assured of anonymity when they claim tickets at the box office. Once on the list of Kulturloge members, they receive a telephone call by volunteers when tickets for their preferred cultural events become available. If they confirm that they will attend, Kulturloge arranges everything else. While a Berlin Pass marks the owner as a "charity case," Kulturloge guests can maintain their dignity by simply picking up their reserved ticket at the box office. The others waiting in line -- even the salespersons -- have no clue they are "different."

Everybody Wins
The Grips Theater, Admiralspalast, Literaturhaus Berlin and the current exhibition at the Schloss Charlottenburg are among the 15 cultural partners who have already pledged support as partners. Meyenburg's team is optimistic that the next partner acquisitions will include the Berliner Ensemble, Friedrichstadtpalast and the Deutsche Oper.

photo: Jan Oberländer

Everybody wins, says Meyenburg: the cultural establishments, which run to full houses and win audiences from a broad cross-section of the population; the guests, who regain a sense of dignity and perspective by focusing on creativity rather than on mere survival; the city of Berlin; and, of course, the Kulturloge concept -- which shows every indication of being rapidly replicated in other cities.

Gallery Weekend
As I write, Berlin's Gallery Weekend is on: a three-day art marathon, with 40 galleries and 40 openings between Friday, April 30 and Sunday, May 2. At least 700 art collectors from around the world are expected, and participating galleries -- some featuring the work of art celebs such as Damien Hirst and Elizabeth Peyton -- pay eye-popping fees of several thousand Euros.

But the Kulturloge, for me, is the bigger story. Because Berlin is not just another world cultural city -- it is the Kulturstadt with a heart.

"Loge" means a box at a theater. The first Kulturloge initiative started last year in Marburg and has got off to a flying start. Hamburg is slated to follow next. More information is at www.kulturloge-berlin.de

Mind the Gap: What Next for the Kulturforum?

2010-04-14T23:34:00.002+02:00

Just in time for spring weather and banks of daffodils come fresh plans for the Kulturforum on Potsdamer Platz. An ensemble of star cultural institutions in former West Berlin, the Kulturforum includes the Philharmonie (the Berlin Philharmonic), the Gemäldegalerie (Art Gallery), Neue Nationalgalerie (New National Gallery) and Staatsbibliothek (State Library). But the bland concrete lot between the Philharmonie and the Neue Nationalgalerie has been a yawning gap in the cultural landscape, the bane of urban planners. Now here comes a scheme to convert this area into a green space, closed to traffic.

Sleeping Beauty
Time to kiss the Sleeping Beauty awake, says the Urban Planning Commission of the Berlin Senate. It proposes converting this grey area into a park-like landscape with trees, a sculpture garden, terrace, cafe and information pavilion. The buildings belonging to the Kulturforum will be illuminated to emphasize their distinctive form and function (Hans Scharoun designed both the Library and the Philharmonie, Mies van der Rohe the National Gallery), and the forum will host an annual cultural event such as an Arts Festival.

Get Real
Sounds good? Not every one is delighted. Michael Cullen, historian, weighed in with a sharp critique. "Do architects eat? Do they ever stop to have a drink?" he fumed in an article in Berlin's daily newspaper. Yes, the plans look good on an architect's drawing table (says Cullen), but let's get real. Why does Berlin need this green space when the Tiergarten is a stone's throw away? And when people come out of the concert hall, art gallery, museum or library after concentrating on culture for two or three hours, what they need most is somewhere to go with friends for a drink or a meal in the late hours. Look at London, Paris or New York. True urban centers mix culture with more elemental stuff.

Reply to Cullen
Now, Cullen is an authority on Berlin architecture -- in fact, it was Cullen who suggested the famous "Wrapped Reichstag" project to artists Jeanne-Claude and Christo back in the early 1970s, later staying on the team as historical advisor -- so who am I to take issue with his analysis? But I can't resist. Here are my counter-arguments:

a) Take a close look at the pubs and restaurants that we do have around Potsdamer Platz: variations of international chains at rip-off prices, targeted to tourists and avoided by Berliners. Do we honestly need a steakhouse next to St. Matthäuskirche (St. Matthew's Church) or laptop-toters on sofas in a Starbucks outside the Philharmonie's Chamber Music Hall?

b) Museum cafes have refreshments, and so does the Philharmonie during intermission. Now imagine a green space into which concert-goers could spill on a warm summer evening, bringing their wine and cheese; where readers could take a break from the Rare Books Archive, bringing out a brown bag lunch around noon and nodding off for a while; where toddlers-in-tow who have had their fill of trailing behind parents in front of cubist paintings finally have a chance to scamper around. Sounds like just the ticket to me.

c) Also, if you want to head to a cosy pub or restaurant in the late hours in the Potsdamer Platz area, you don't need to draw a blank. About a five-minute walk from the Neue Nationalgalerie is a traditional Berlin restaurant with a warm, homely atmosphere and great food at affordable prices -- a tip from a colleague that I am loath to give away because I had enjoyed keeping this to myself as a "Geheim-Tipp." But all right, here it is: the Joseph-Roth-Diele on Potsdamerstr. 75.

So there, Mr. Cullen.

A note on JR: Joseph Roth was an Austrian writer, one of the finest literary journalists in the German-speaking countries in the 1920s and 30s. His best pieces were written for the Frankfurter Zeitung (now Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, one of Germany's leading news sources) in the form of feuilleton. Still a staple feature of major European newspapers, feuilleton sections include literary-style book, theater and film reviews. Roth's reports from Berlin in the 1920s were collected as a guidebook in the 1990s and appears in a recent English translation as What I saw: Reports from Berlin, 1920-33.

Calligraphy and More

2010-03-17T18:52:00.024+01:00

This exquisite wooden and mother-of-pearl door is from eighteenth-century Gujerat in India -- just one of 200 objects on display in the Treasures of the Aga Khan Museum exhibition featuring Masterpieces of Islamic Art, which opened today in the Martin Gropius Bau.

Photo: Sean Gallup/Getty Images

The artworks on display -- miniature paintings, book illustrations, manuscripts, wood carvings, metal work, ceramics, jewellery, ivory ornamentation, religious inscriptions -- cover a span of time from the 8th to the 18th century, and a dizzying half-spin of the globe from the Iberian peninsula, through Sicily, Egypt, the Ottoman Empire, Persia, Central Asia and on to the Moghul Empire in India.

They are just one-fifth of the collection belonging to the Aga Khan Trust for Culture, based in Geneva, which includes about 1000 of the Islamic world's most valuable treasures, documenting its rich history over ten centuries. The collection's owner is Karim Aga Khan IV, the billionaire philanthropist who is also the spiritual head of the Ismaili Muslims and regarded as the direct descendant of the Prophet.

The pearl-inlaid wooden door from Gujerat, the monumental turquoise glazed stone jar from 13th century Iran, the Anwar-i-Suhayli (Lights of Canopus) illustrated fables from the 15th century, the pages of the Blue Quran from North Africa, all make me want to catch the next flight out to Geneva to see the rest of this incredible collection.

But I was perhaps most captivated by one of the first and -- at 28 centimeters in length -- one of the smallest of the objects on display.

On the preserved leaf of a chestnut tree, a nineteenth-century artist from the Ottoman Empire has inscribed a Quran text in beaten gold.

In the calligraphic curves of the script you recognize the form of an ancient rowing boat, the raised oars of the sailors cutting through the waves. At the same time, you trace the filigree patterns of the leaf's veins shimmering transparently through the gold. The work is a marvel: this tiny object prompts you to think about nature, art, writing, sacred scripture, mystery, beauty and poetry -- and the vision that drew these vast fields of knowledge together in so compressed a form.

The exhibition runs till June 6, 2010 at the Martin Gropius Bau. If you are in Berlin during this time, put the Treasures of the Aga Khan Museum on your Must See list. This is the first time these artworks are being shown in Germany, and the exhibition is making its last appearance in Europe before the collection finally travels "home" to Toronto, Canada, where it will be housed in the new Aga Khan Museum, starting 2013.

"Treasures of the Aga Khan Musuem" is showing at the Martin Gropius Bau, Niederkirchnerstraße 7, 10963 Berlin, till June 6, 2010. Open everyday except Tuesday, from 10 am to 8 pm. Entrance is 8 EUR (reduced fee: 6 EUR). You can also take advantage of the "Long Nights" at the Martin Gropius from April 28 to May 1, when exhibitions remain open from 10 am to 12 midnight. Public transportation: take U2 or S1, 2 or 25 to Potsdamer Platz.

More information is at www.gropiusbau.de

Winter Warmers (5): Movie Magic

2010-02-26T15:02:00.002+01:00

Even if you are not old enough to be nostalgic about drive-in movies, or remember watching Cary Grant on the big screen through the windshield of a bright pink Chevy, you'll still love the idea of British video artist Phil Collins to bring the drive-in experience to an installation in Berlin's Temporäre Kunsthalle (Temporary Art Musuem).

Photo: copyright, Getty Images

Cars with Character

Collins (no relation to the ex-Genesis singer/songwriter), has transformed Berlin's temporary art museum on the Schlossplatz into an indoor drive-in movie theater. Not for Collins the glamor of Hollywood films, nor the iconic cars of 1950s America. Instead, Collins concentrates on German and experimental films, and he has hand-picked a fleet of 15 second-hand cars from a car-dealer on Köpenick Strasse in Kreuzberg. They come in different flavors: cosy Citroen, Peugot and Renault; roomy Ford, Nissan and Opel-Corsa; swanky BMW, Audi and Mercedes; and always, leather seats preferred.

"I wanted cars with character, with a Berlin past," says Collins. "I wasn't looking for Chevys, but rather for cars we were not at all nostalgic about -- practical cars like VW and Opel."

Himmel über Berlin

For the showings each evening till March 14, Collins has chosen 111 films, among them German productions from the 1930s and 40s to the present day, including melodramas produced by Ufa (Universum Film AG, the principal film studio during the Weimar Republic and through World War II) and Defa (Deutsche Film AG, the main film studio of the German Democratic Republic). "Auto-Kino!" covers a range of forms: experimental and essay films, art videos, documentaries, thrillers, classic who-dun-its, Japanese art and graphic art films. Most film classics are shown in their splendid original 35 mm. version.

"I wanted to create a spectrum as wide as the Himmel über Berlin," says Collins, referring to the German title of the Wim Wenders film "Wings of Desire." As an artist, he is interested in the various forms in which media is presented, and fascinated by the power of film to manipulate but also to shape the search for identity of a place or community.

Passion Pits

Drive-in movie theaters, called "Passion-Pits" by the watchful moral guardians of 1950s America, never really caught on in Germany -- perhaps because here, small and mid-size local theaters provided the kind of living-room atmosphere sought by romantic couples. Collins' installation, however, has had a successful run since it opened, and many showings are sold out early. Either romance is in the air, or the unforgiving winter has enhanced the lure of leather seats in which you can hunker down.

As winter 2010 shows no sign of loosening its icy grip, Berliners have warmed to "Auto-Kino!" Ditching their downloaded films on PCs and I-Pods for a while, they have reverted to watching cinema in an intimate, companionable setting. Safe in their VW station wagon, they don't have to worry about a sibilant "Shhh!" from the back row if they make a remark or rustle a bag of chips.

"Auto-Kino!" takes place every day from 2 pm to 9 pm till March 14 at the Temporäre Kunsthalle, Schlossplatz (Mitte), 10178 Berlin. Entrance is free. Call to make a reservation as there are only 30 seats available. T. +49 (0)30 2060 5512. Public Transportation: S and U-Bahn Friedrichstrasse or Bus 100 or 200 to Lustgarten on Unter den Linden. The complete program is available at www.kunsthalle-berlin.com

"Auto-Kino!" is made possible by a grant from the DAAD and was included as one of the venues in the "Forum Expanded" section of the Berlinale, Berlin's International Film Festival, in February.

Winter Warmers (4): Red Carpet at the Berlinale

2010-02-05T19:28:00.002+01:00

Every February, the red carpet at the Berlinale, Berlin's International Film Festival, brings a welcome note of warmth to the deep mid-winter. This year is the Berlinale's 60th, and its organizers have introduced an interesting new feature to mark the anniversary.

Flying Red Carpet
In 2010, the Berlinale's red carpet will not be reserved for the large venues that host the festival's participating films. Instead, for the first time, a flying red carpet will also move out to smaller neighborhood cinemas. "Berlinale goes Kiez" ("Kiez" = neighborhood) is the brainchild of Berlinale director, Dieter Kosslick. "We want to put Berlin's wonderful art house cinemas in the limelight and, at the same time, say thank you to the ardent cineasts who have been faithful to this festival for so long," says Kosslick. He has reason to be proud: the Berlinale enjoys the largest audience of any film festival in the world.

Renee Zellweger, Berlinale 2010 jury member photo: dpa

Coming to a Theater near You
On ten evenings between February 12 and 21, a selected art house cinema will feature two festival films. A red carpet will be unrolled for each gala screening and, as in the larger venues, directors, producers and members of the film team will be present -- only this time the audience will have a chance to interact with them in a much smaller, more intimate setting.

Scene from Niels Arden Oplev's Drømmen photo: Deutsche Kinemathek

The ten art house cinemas include: Adria in Steglitz; Capitol Dahlem in Zehlendorf; Eva Lichtspiele in Wilmersdorf; Hackesche Höfe Kino in Mitte; Kant Kino in Charlottenburg; Moviemento in Kreuzberg; Neues Off in Neukölln; Odeon in Schöneberg; Kino Toni and Tonino in Weißensee; and Union Filmtheater in Köpenick.

Snow lies round about, deep and crisp and not so even, but see if we care! Red carpet glamor will arrive at our own neighborhood theaters --- a world away from soulless multiplexes in shopping malls -- and we will lose ourselves once again in the magic of the big screen and world-class cinema.

The 60th Berlinale runs February 11-21, 2010, and will feature 392 films from around the world. Tickets go on sale from Monday, February 8. The festival officially opens on February 11 with the premiere of the Chinese film Tuan Yuan in the Berlinale Palast. More information in both German and English is available at the Berlinale website www.berlinale.de

Winter Warmers (3): The Tajik Tea Room

2010-01-25T00:01:00.025+01:00

Berlin is in the grip of a Siberian winter, and the sun has not broken through grey clouds in fourteen days. When winter doesn't quite feel like wonderland, it's time to head to the Tajik tea room for some Oriental warmth.

Just off Unter den Linden, behind the Deutsches Historisches Museum (German Historical Museum), is the Palais am Festungsgraben -- an eighteenth-century palace residence built by Frederick the Great for his wife's royal valet.

photo: Peter Groth, 2007

Damaged by the bombing during the Second World War, the building was restored by the Soviet military after 1945. The reproduction of a traditional Central Asian tea room, where men relaxed on cushions and played board games, was originally the contribution of the then-Soviet republics of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan to the 1974 Leipzig Exhibition. The pavilion was later moved to the palace which, at the time of the GDR regime, served as the House of Culture of the Soviet Union.

Head for the first floor up a splendid marble stairway. From the interior architecture of eighteenth-century royal Prussia you step into a room redolent of ancient Persia.

photo: Johan Tingne

Sixteen carved sandalwood beams decorate the ceiling, and a row of hand-carved columns runs the length of the room. Miniature paintings on the walls depict scenes from traditional folk tales from the mountainous regions of the Silk Road. Cushions are covered in vibrant green, yellow and purple silk, and carpets feel warm under your feet (guests leave their shoes along with coats and bags in the hall outside the room). Seating is on divans, an arrangement of mattresses and cushions around low wooden tables, although you can opt for chairs if you prefer. Once comfortably seated, you can draw a deep breath. While it looks like this outside ...

photo: ddp

... you can snuggle deeper into the cushions and forget about icy S-Bahn stations for a blissful hour or two. No need to hurry -- the tea takes time to brew.

At the Teestube, tea (and there are at least 20 different varieties) is brewed with care. Ceylon tea is served in an earthenware pot and Japanese teas in purist porcelain. You can order scones and clotted cream with English varieties, and if you ask for the Russian tea ceremony, a silver samovar will arrive on a tray with a slew of accompaniments including rum raisins, marmalade, crystallized lemon and orange. Snacks with a Russian/Central Asian theme (pirogi, blini, pelmeni, etc.) round out the menu.

No longer an "insider tip" (alas!), the Tajik tea room is often full, so it is wise to call ahead and reserve seating. During the winter months there are storytelling evenings (from the Arabian Nights and other magical tales) on Tuesdays at 6 pm.

The Tadshikische Teestube is at Am Festungsgraben 1, off Unter den Linden. Public transportation: S1 or S2 to S-Friedrichstr., or U6 to U-Französischestr., or Bus 100 or 200 to the Staatsoper stop on Unter den Linden.

Open Monday to Friday, 5pm to 12 midnight, and Saturday and Sunday, 3pm to 12 midnight. Call (030) 2041112 for reservations.

Winter Warmers (2): Just Chocolate

2010-01-18T12:01:00.001+01:00

There's nothing like chocolate -- pure, rich and sinfully good -- to chase away the winter blues. So it's good news that Ritter Sport, the 100-year-old family-run chocolate manufacturer from southern Germany, has just opened a flagship store in Berlin.

Chocoholics around the world easily recognize Ritter Sport because of its packaging -- the distinctive square shape and use of a bright color palette. Each color stands for a different chocolate variety (there are 25 of them), and each 100 gm square-shaped bar is divided into 16 smaller squares, making a four-by-four pack.

Quadratisch. Praktisch. Gut.
The flagship store, Bunte Schokowelt (Colorful World of Chocolate), plays with these two visual elements, making them into an eye-catching display theme. Brightly colored quadrants are a repeated motif: whether in wall design, the form of storage shelves or the surfaces of lounge tables. There is a designer chic to Bunte Schokowelt. It may dare to be square, but this is one cool store.

Mmmm-elted Chocolate
At the chocolateria on the ground floor you can order one of several varieties of hot chocolate: melted Ritter Sport with foamed milk or with a dash of espresso or pinch of cinnamon. A mug of their melted Mousse au Chocolat (as rich as a dessert) will make you forget the snow outside in a few delirious minutes.

The chocolatier will also make up an individual chocolate bar by adding your combination of ingredients from the array on offer, including anis, strawberry, chili, marshmallows, puffed rice and peppermint. If you're looking for an original gift idea, try making your own chocolate creation.

On the first floor, the Chocolate Path is a multi-media museum display that traces the journey of chocolate from the cocoa bean to the familiar snappy, wrapped quadrant. A short film (worth the watch) takes you through the history of the Ritter Sport company (English version on headphones), and an interactive screen shows you Ritter Sport television ads through the decades -- an interesting highlight since Ritter Sport made the very first countrywide television commercial back in 1970.

Choco-Workshop
An innovative feature is the chocolate workshop in the basement, where kids (no adults allowed) can learn about their favorite food group and even make their own chocolate bar and candy wrapper. An excellent idea to keep kids engrossed in a useful activity -- I'm adding this to my Berlin for Kids Tour for my nephew (7) -- but remember to book online ahead of time, as I'm sure this is going to be popular with school groups.

Quality. Chocolate. Squared.
By the way, do you know what sports have to do with Ritter chocolate?

The idea came from the wife of Alfred Ritter, the company's founder. Clara Göttle noticed at a soccer game (her eye was clearly not on the ball) that men made a mess of chocolate bars crammed into the pockets of their sports jackets. Why not make a chocolate that fits into every jacket pocket but that weighs the same as the long rectangular bar, she thought? A handy candy, in other words. The idea was a hit.

Clara had her eye on the ball, after all.

Bunte Schokowelt opened on January 15 at Französischestr. 24, 10117 Berlin, in the Gendarmenmarkt square (U6, Französischestr.). The store is in a historic building, 1000 square meters in area and on three levels.

Opening hours are: Monday through Thursday: 10:00 am to 8 pm; Friday and Saturday: 10:00 am to 10:00 pm, and Sunday: 10:00 am to 6 pm. Entrance is free. The chocolate workshop is 75 minutes long and costs 8 EUR per participant. The age group is 7-18 (except for kindergarten classes).

Lots more information is available on the company's very cool website at www.ritter-sport.com

Winter Warmers (1): Noon Song

2010-01-03T22:44:00.002+01:00

The Christmas Markets have disappeared from the city squares, the last stalls with warm roasted almonds are melting away with the snow, the New Year firework display at the Brandenburger Tor is only a memory, and as January sets in, it feels like time to balance all that exuberant Yang with some more rueful Yin.

So I'm introducing a series of entries through the months of January and February called Winter Warmers: Berliners' personal favorites for places to warm body and soul.

Thirty Minutes of Heaven
My first pick is Noon Song, thirty minutes of heaven every Saturday at the Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz. Eight professional singers form Sirventes, a choir that performs mostly Renaissance (but sometimes Romantic or contemporary) choral music. Unlike a concert at the Chamber Music Hall at the Philharmonie, this performance embeds the music in the liturgy for which it was composed and so has a meditative quality that is deeply moving.

Noon Song is the brainchild of Stefan Schuck, who explains that the tradition of marking each hour of the day with sacred music goes back to the Benedictine monks.

The weekly Saturday market takes place opposite the church, and most listeners come in directly from their shopping, lugging bags and baskets of flowers, cheese, or vegetables. The music is a heavenly interlude that begins and ends in the earthy reality of the market stands.

Last week, I bought sweet potatoes and carrots for a winter soup, then came in and listened to the pure sounds of choral arrangements by Schein, Praetorius, and Schütz. You couldn't do much better for food that warms body and soul.

50 Years of Noon Song
Saturday, 9 January 2010, will be the fiftieth performance of Noon Song, and Schuck plans to make it special. Don't miss it.

Noon Song takes place every Saturday at 12:00 noon at the Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz (U3, Hohenzollernplatz). Entrance is free, but you can show your appreciation of the music by making a contribution at the door. You can read more about Sirventes and Noon Song at www.noonsong.de

Global Stone: Five Continents Meet in the Tiergarten

2009-12-15T20:02:00.004+01:00

"The quickest way to find yourself is to sail once around the world." These words from the biography of Bernd Moitessier, philosopher and passionate sailor, were the inspiration for Wolfgang Kraker von Schwarzenfeld, the artist whose Global Stone project is about to be completed in Berlin's Tiergarten.

In his 20s, von Schwarzenfeld began a sailing voyage around the world. His trimaran capsized in the Atlantic, off the Florida coast. He survived sixteen days in chest-deep ice-cold water, eating raw fish (not a gourmet experience, he discovered), drinking salt water in desperation, and close to dying from hypothermia. In a near-death experience, he looked at the sky and endless horizon stretching around him to infinity and thought to himself: "There is no end point to life. All of mankind is one entity, like the millions of cells in a human body."

This thought became the germ of an idea that von Schwarzenfeld has spent the greater part of his life realizing -- a project he calls "Global Stone."

Sailing around the world in "Pegasus," his three-masted sailboat, von Schwarzenfeld searched on each of five continents for a pair of magnificent stones, similar in substance, form, and weight (approximately 30 tons). Once he had made his choice, he left one of the "sister stones" in the country of origin, bringing the other (at considerable cost and with mind-boggling logistic planning) to Berlin's Tiergarten. The last of the five stones to be brought to Berlin will arrive tomorrow -- from Bhutan.

The stones in the Tiergarten have been so arranged that their polished surfaces reflect the sunlight in five invisible straight lines. The "sister stones" on the five continents have also been carefully arranged by the artist so that once a year, on June 21st, the sunlight glances off their surface, travels in a frequency of 16 minutes around the world, and meets the pentagram of light between the stones in Berlin exactly at high noon.

The stones -- each a natural wonder, polished, sculptured and inscribed by the artist with one of five linked themes: Awakening, Hope, Forgiveness, Love, and Peace -- are a kind of hieroglyph of the connection between Berlin and the world, as well as the interconnectedness of all nations on these five continents.

I can't think of a better note on which to end my last blog before Christmas 2009.

You can find the Global Stone Project near the Löwengruppe (The Lions) in the Tiergarten. Keeping the Brandenburger Tor behind you, follow the Ahornsteig for 300 m. Or, from Potsdamer Platz, enter the Park from behind the Sony Center, and walk about 250 m.

Love Songs from the GDR

2009-11-28T01:18:00.006+01:00

Suse Jank was only five years old when the Berlin Wall fell, and her memories of life in the GDR seem as though they belong to a distant past. But she does have vivid memories of the songs her father sang to her. He would pick up his guitar and sing to Suse and her sister the sentimental or romantic songs of bands such as Silly, Rent, Lift or singers such as Veronika Fischer or Petra Zieger.

Now, Jank and her band recreate those pop songs of the GDR in a version bound to appeal to contemporary audiences. Her newest CD, due out on November 30, is called "Ostpoesie" or East Poetry. But her CD is not an "Ostalgie" trip, Jank insists. We perform this music not because of any loyalty to the ideology of the former East, she says, but simply because these songs have charm, originality and a certain timeless quality. Jank believes they deserve a fresh interpretation.

Photo: SUPERillu/Handelmann

So, too, does her pianist and arranger, Clemens Süßenbach, who accompanies her on "Ostpoesie." Süßenbach is a jazz pianist who has lived all his life in Zehlendorf, in the West, but he fell in love with GDR rock and pop after Jank introduced him to some of its classic hits.

These are fascinating songs, says Süßenbach, especially as many were written to express individuality and desire in a time of political repression. When I first heard Silly's song "SOS", I thought: Cool! A pop song about ships. Only later did I figure out that a critique of the political system ran right through the song.

Photo: SUPERillu/Handelmann

For Jank, these are primarily songs from her childhood, and she takes great care in choosing her repertoire, paying special attention to the texts. They often have a wonderful visual poetry about them, she says. Listen to her sing Manfred Krug's "Wenn du schläfst mein Kind," or "When you sleep, my child," and you will know what she means.

Jank's crystal clear voice and heartfelt rendition of these forgotten songs from the GDR often move her audiences, sometimes to tears. It hardly matters whether she and her band play in the "newcomer" states of the Federal Republic or in the old West.

Photo: SUPERillu/Handelmann

You can catch Suse Jank and her international band (the other three members are from Sweden, Italy and Armenia) at their record-release celebratory performance at the B-Flat jazz club on Monday, November 30 -- the day "Ostpoesie" hits the music stores.

Suse Jank and her band will perform in B-Flat, Rosenthalerstr. 13, 10119 Berlin, on Monday, November 30, at 21:00. Tickets are 10 EUR, 8 EUR reduced price. Nearest stop is S-Bahn Hackescher Markt. More information is at www.b-flat-berlin.de

If you miss them at B-Flat, you can hear Jank and her band on December 12 at 17:00 at the Amerika Gedenkbibliothek, Blücherplatz 1, 10961 Berlin (Kreuzberg).

Check It Out: Berlin gets a new Library

2009-11-19T16:50:00.004+01:00

Check it out! At Berlin's new library, Humboldt University's Jakob-und-Wilhelm-Grimm-Zentrum, you can do so -- literally.

At last Berlin has a library that matches the standards of public and university libraries in most world cities. The average university library in Germany has tended to be faintly depressing: bicycle-cluttered entrances, dreary coin-operated lockers (mostly malfunctioning), disheveled lounge areas and grubby vending machines, cranky photocopiers, even crankier librarians, and uncomfortable, elbow-rubbing work spaces.

The Grimm Zentrum is an entirely new ball game.

Photo: Stefan Müller

Open for business at the start of the Winter Semester, the library throws open its doors to the public today for an Open Day. The new building replaces the old main library and twelve branch libraries of the Humboldt University, covering the humanities, economics, social and cultural sciences. Spiffy new technology allows you to check out and return books, and access all the information you need electronically.

If the first few weeks are anything to go by, today should be a knockout success. The maximum capacity of 5000 visitors daily has already been reached. According to Olaf Eigenbrodt in administrative services, this is more than the number of visitors all the former branch libraries of Humboldt University combined received in a week!

Photo: Stefan Müller

Much of the Grimm Zentrum's success has to do with its architecture and interior design, conceived by the Swiss architect Max Dudler. It most unique feature is the main reading rooms, which Dudler has constructed as suspended galleries from each of the five floors above the central area. The combination of warm, dark cherry wood and cool, elegant glass creates an aesthetically pleasing atmosphere in which to work. From the reading rooms you look out over at the stacks on either side as through a wooden lattice work.

Every architectural and design detail has been carefully considered. The long rectangular shapes of the windows are repeated in the open wood panels on either side of the reading rooms as well as in the table tops (green linoleum, reminiscent of panes of frosted glass), and even in the rectangular shape of the lamps with their transparent shades. Very classy!

If, for a moment, your mind wanders from the book in front of you, you might catch sight of the S-Bahn swooshing silently by.

The Grimm Zentrum ls located in the S-Bahn viaduct right next to the S and U Friedrichstrasse station. Its holdings include 1. 5 million books in stacks, and a further 1 million books in storage. There are 1250 work spaces, many equipped with computers and Internet access. Currently open every weekday from 8 AM to 12 midnight, on weekends from 10 AM to 6 PM.

Berlin Remembers

2009-11-09T17:26:00.170+01:00

Berliners remember the confusion, disbelief, overwhelming joy and emotional reunions they experienced twenty years ago to the day, on November 9, 1989.

Today, however, is a day not only for the Berliners but for the rest of the world. Over two thousand journalists and television crews, over thirty heads of state, and hundreds of thousands of visitors from around the world are here. This evening they will converge on the Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate), a focal point for the commemorations of the fall of the Berlin Wall, although it was never actually part of the Wall.

The Brandenburger Tor as Symbol
Every day Karl-Heinz zur Weihen of the Berlin Senate receives requests from advertisers and film makers to use the gate as a background. One installation artist wanted to drape a giant banana over the columns, another wanted to construct a rainbow above.

Why is the Brandenburger Tor such a powerful symbol?

Commissioned by Frederick William II in the late eighteenth century to replace the old baroque city gates, it was designed by the architect Carl Gotthard Langhans. Inspired by the Propylaea of Athens, Langhans brought the strict lines of neoclassical design to Berlin's city architecture. The double row of six Doric columns marked the outer end of the grand axis of Unter den Linden.

The "Horse Thief"
The gate's most distinctive feature is the copper quadriga above the central columns, the work of the young sculptor Johann Gottfried Schadow. The quadriga portrays the Roman goddess of victory, riding in her chariot drawn by four horses galloping into the eastern part of the city.

Napoleon bagged the quadriga -- chariot, goddess, horses and all -- when the French army defeated Prussia in 1806, and spirited it away to Paris. It was a matter of pride for the Prussian army when they returned the quadriga to Berlin in a triumphant procession after they had routed Napoleon's forces in 1814. The gate became a "Gate of Victory," and the square in which it stood became (and still is today) the Pariser Platz (Paris Square).

The Victory Gate
The gate remained a symbol of Prussian power and military might as long as the empire lasted. After that, it became the backdrop for military parades and ceremonial receptions. On the night of January 30, 1933, when Hitler was appointed Chancellor, rows of torch-bearing brownshirts paraded through the grand columns.

By 1945 the gate was badly damaged, shot at first by the Germans after Soviet soldiers planted their red flag atop it, then by the Red Army. Reconstruction workers counted 50,000 bullet scars. After 1945, the gate stood within Soviet territory, but nobody stopped Berliners from walking through the gate, past the sign that said: You are now leaving the Soviet sector.

"Open this Gate!"
On August 13, 1961, the sound of power drills filled the square. Cement blocks were laid out in a semi-circle in front of the gate, marking the outer limits of Berlin's Mitte district and the inner boundary of the Soviet-occupied territory. This became one segment of the Berlin Wall. Soon the Brandenburger Tor stood in no-man's land, cut off from the West, accessible in the East only to guests and dignitaries invited by the State.

When John F. Kennedy visited in 1963, the heads of state in East Berlin had red banners hung between the columns to block the view into the east.

"As long as the Brandenburger Tor remains closed," said Richard von Weizsäcker, former President of the Federal Republic and the first head of state of a unified Germany "the German question remains open."

In 1987, Ronald Reagan's words echoed across the world: "Mister Gorbachev, open this gate!"

November 9, 1989
Then, on November 9, 1989, a documentary film camera and a microphone recorded how a woman from Linienstrasse in the former East Berlin, Bärbel Reinke, rushed up to one of the guards in front of the Brandenburger Tor and cried out in anger and frustration: "All I want is to go through these gates and back again. My sons serve in the army of the GDR -- is this all so hard to understand?" Her heart still beats faster, says Bärbel Reinke, when she rides her bicycle through the gate.

This evening, at 6:30 PM, when Daniel Barenboim's orchestra tunes up, I know where I'll be.

Berlin, Rejoice!

2009-10-29T23:05:00.002+01:00

November 9, 1989. After 28 years of dividing the city, the Berlin Wall fell, and the call, "Berlin, Rejoice!" rang out through the chaos of overwhelming emotions that gripped the city.

"Berlin, Rejoice!" is the theme of the benefit concert in the Berliner Dom (Berlin Cathedral) on Monday, November 9, that celebrates the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. For the first time in history, the Rundfunk-Sinfonie Orchestra, Berlin (Berlin's Radio Symphony Orchestra) and its choir, the Rundfunkchor Berlin, will perform together with the Deutsches Symphonie Orchester (or DSO), and the RIAS Kammerchor (RIAS Chamber Choir).

The significance of this memorial concert is enormous. The RSO, Germany's oldest radio symphony orchestra, was under the supervision of the GDR radio from 1949 till the Fall of the Berlin Wall, while the DSO was established by the US forces during the occupation. At that time it was known as the RIAS Orchestra, the acronym standing for Rundfunk im amerikanischen Sektor, or Broadcasting in the American Sector, the radio station to which the orchestra was linked. During the Berlin blockade, RIAS played a central role in carrying the message of the Allied forces' determination to resist Soviet intimidation.

On Monday, November 9, the four great orchestra/choirs will perform together in a unique commemoration of reunification.

The program includes sacred music by Schubert and Mendelssohn -- a tribute to the religious tolerance in which freedom is rooted; Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Schönberg's "Friede auf Erden" -- an expression of the magnitude of the event; and Richard Wagner's Overture from "Die Meistersinger vom Nürnberg" -- a reference to the long shadows cast by history.

The performance will be transmitted live on Deutschlandfunk, BBC, Radiotelevisione Italiana, as well as radio stations in Denmark, Lithuania, Canada and Romania.

"20 Jahre Mauerfall - Das Konzert" takes place at the Berliner Dom on Monday, November 11 at 8:30 PM. Tickets are between 15 EUR and 70 EUR and are available at the ticket counter of the Berliner Dom every day between 11 AM and 6 PM (though tickets are going fast). Public transportation to the Berliner Dom includes: U and S-Bahn to Alexanderplatz; S-Bahn to Hackescher Markt, Bus 100 and 200 to Lustgarten. More information is available at www.musikinkirchen.de

Berlin's Neues Museum Opens after Seven Decades

2009-10-17T18:18:00.081+02:00

Long lines snaked across Berlin's Lustgarten this morning. The line started gathering momentum as early as 7 am on this cold, grey, blustery day -- three hours before Berlin's Neues Museum opened to the public.

This is a great day for Berlin -- the renovations by British architect David Chipperfield, which took ten years of discussion, debate, planning and construction, is brought to light; the last of the five-museum ensemble in Berlin's Museum Island is now in place; and the Neues Museum is open for regular viewing for the first time in seventy years.

Phoenix from the Ashes
Built by Friedrich August Stüler between 1855 and 1859, the museum was hastily emptied of its exhibits at the start of the Second World War. By 1945 there was nothing left of the beautiful neoclassical building except rubble. After the war, the GDR repaired the worst of the damage, but the building remained a scarred, war-torn ruin for about another half century.

photo: ddp

When Chipperfield first took on the project in the 1990s, he saw a ruin forgotten by history. His idea -- radical, audacious, fiercely contested and just as fiercely defended -- was to rebuild the museum without letting go of the original materials. Into the new structure, with modern features such as slim pillars and glass roofs, he incorporated parts of the original structure -- fragments of frescoes, wall, mosaics and raw brick, still bearing the marks of ravage by bullets, fire-bombs, and exposure to the forces of nature for over half a century.

Statement in Marble
The museum's most dramatic feature is probably the central staircase in cement and marble, sweeping up toward the high ceiling, stripped of decorative elements. Chipperfield's design recalls at once the original ornamental staircase and the image of its burned out remnants.

photo: ddp

Nefertiti

The Neues Museum houses artifacts from the Egyptian Museum, its Papyrus Collection, and the Museum of Pre-and-Early History. The star of the show will undoubtedly be the 3,400-year old bust of Nefertiti in the north cupola, her gaze shooting across the entire length of the building, through hall after hall, era after era, finally meeting that of the Sun God Helios in the south cupola, in a breathtaking axis of perspective.

photo: Getty Images

Musuem in a Museum

The Neues Museum is more than "just" a museum. Like the Reichstag dome and the Gedächtniskirche, it shows how the city grapples with the problem of restoring and renewing without forgetting. But probably no other building in Berlin comes close to the Neues Museum in the way its reconstruction has embraced both the original architectural vision and the damage of war in its concept of renewal.

The Neues Museum is located on the Museum Island, Bodestraße 3, 10178 Berlin. Public transportation options include: S-Bahn to Hackescher Markt, tram M4, M5, M6 to Hackescher Markt, Bus 100, 200 to Lustgarten.

The museum is free to the public this Saturday and Sunday ( expect very long lines). From Monday on, the museum is open every day: from 10:00 to 18:00 on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday; from 10:.00 to 20:.00 on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Tickets cost 10 EUR (5 EUR reduced). Tickets are valid for entry within a specific half-hour window of time to minimize long waits. You can order tickets for your preferred window of time online at www.neues-museum.de
There is no restriction on the amount of time you can spend inside.

More information is at www.neues-museum.de

Berlin's Konzerthaus Turns 25

2009-10-03T13:52:00.002+02:00

Why does a 1980s concert hall look like a nineteenth-century theater?
Berlin's Konzerthaus at Gendarmenmarkt, which turns 25 this year, was originally built as a royal theater by nineteenth-century star architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel. From 1821 to 1945, it hosted the city's top stage productions.

Devastating fires in the last days of the Second World War completely destroyed the beautiful theater. For four decades it lay in ruins, a blot on the landscape of East Berlin's historic district.

A second chance came in 1985, when Erich Honecker ordered the renewal and reconstruction of the Gendarmenmarkt for Berlin's 750th anniversary celebrations. The GDR's cultural elite decided that East Berlin theater did not need yet another venue for stage productions, so Schinkel's royal theater was to reappear as a concert hall, built in a contemporary architectural style.

The architects chosen for the project, however, begged to differ. They proposed designing the new building in a style as true to Schinkel's original concept as possible and restoring the site to its former glory.

The Konzerthaus was home to the Berlin Symphony Orchestra (BSO), but it was also intended to host artists of international repute who would add to the cultural prestige of the GDR. One of them was Leonard Bernstein, who conducted here six times between 1984 and 1989.

On Christmas Day, 1989, Bernstein returned to the concert hall to conduct Beethoven's Ninth Symphony -- a performance that many will remember for its historical piquancy.

And so, here it is - Berlin's Konzerthaus, resplendent in its nineteenth-century gilt and ornamental style, celebrating a young twenty-five years.

The celebrations this weekend, which opened with a performance by the Konzerthaus Orchestra (formerly the BSO) of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, include a program of concerts, guided tours, colloquiums and films.

The special program celebrating the 25th anniversary runs till October 4. The Konzerthaus is at the Gendarmenmarkt (U2 Stadtmitte). A complete program with ticket information for the various events is at www.konzerthaus.de

The Empty Museum

2009-09-27T20:54:00.006+02:00

Far away from this weekend's Art Forum Berlin at the Messehalle, is an empty museum open to the public -- the best tip I received for the week.

Photo: ⓒ Adrian Welsh

Berlin's Well-Kept Secrets
Berlin has seen the "empty museum" phenomenon before. In 1999, visitors who took part in an architectural tour of the Jewish Museum before a single exhibit had been moved inside, sensed the powerful atmosphere created by Daniel Libeskind's design. In March this year, the empty Neues Museum on Museum Island (due to open this October) invited in the public one weekend and created a sensation.

This time it is the Bauhaus Archive/Museum of Design. All its exhibits are currently at the Martin-Gropius-Bau in the largest Bauhaus exhibition ever to be presented: "Bauhaus: A Conceptual Model," which runs till October 4. In the meantime, the Bauhaus Archive, stripped of its collection, is open to the public.

Photo: ⓒ Adrian Welsh

A Space Transformed
In its empty state, the building has undergone a dramatic transformation.

Originally designed in the 1960s by Walter Gropius for a steeply sloping site in Darmstadt, the museum was finally built ten years later on flat terrain in Berlin's Tiergarten. When architects had to adjust the ground plans, they turned the building's axis 180°. This meant that the large exhibition hall, with its floor to ceiling windows, now faced south instead of north, constantly open to sunlight. The curators worried about protecting the exhibits from over-exposure.

The solution was dark shades that covered all the glass and viewing galleries around the building, as well as the skylights on the saw-toothed roofs. This worked for conservation purposes but, of course, changed the character of the building as envisaged by its creator.

Now the shades are off. Light floods in through the South Hall windows, the galleries and the skylights. Suddenly, the whole building is transparent. Interiors harmonize with the surrounding landscape as the vista of the Landwehr Canal, curving alongside, opens up. Ah! you think, here -- finally! -- is the real beauty of Gropius's plan.

Don't Miss
Here are five things not to miss when you visit:
1. A guided tour or audio-guide -- both have interesting anecdotes about past and future plans for the building
2. The replica of Gropius's 60s chrome breakfast bar, left over from a previous exhibition and standing in the South Hall
3. The cafe, which offers a Create your Own Sandwich special. The concept is graphic designer Susann Unger's, and is pure Bauhaus. You "build" your sandwich on a plain wooden board -- your choice of bread with a selection of spreads arranged in small glass jars, all specialties from local manufacturers: three peppercorn or tomato-basil butter, pure raspberry, apricot-lavender or ricotta-mint. Perfect!
4. An old patio table by the Landwehr Canal where you can enjoy your creative sandwich under the trees in peace and quiet
5. The museum shop, which has wonderful design items (some of them quite affordable) for the home and office. (I have my eye on a certain teapot.)

The empty Bauhaus-Archiv/Museum für Gestaltung is open to the public in its "schön anzusehen" ("a beautiful sight") program, which runs till October 4. The museum is located at Klingelhöferstraße 14 (S and U-Bahn Zoologischer Garten). Take Bus 100 from the station till Budapesterstraße, then walk north to the Lützowerufer, cross the bridge over the Landwehrkanal, and you will see the distinctive industrial-style roof of the museum on your right -- about a 5-10 minute walk.

The museum is open daily, except Tuesdays, from 10 am to 5 pm. Tickets are 3 EUR (reduced fee, 1.50 EUR) and include an audio guide. The program also includes architectural tours and film shows.
More information is at www.bauhaus.de

This year is the 90th anniversary of the foundation of the Bauhaus.

September Picnic at the Jewish Museum

2009-09-22T17:11:00.013+02:00

While Berliners are used to blustery, grey Septembers, this year the weather has been grand -- a long, hot summer, and now balmy Fall weather. Days are perceptibly shorter, so people are out savoring the golden September. And the city has so much on offer: sidewalk cafes, beer gardens and beach bars by the River Spree.

My tip: head to the Jewish Museum. No, not for for the exhibition this time, but for the beautiful garden behind the museum.

Walking through the garden, planned in the 1980s by architect Hans Kollhoff, you move through a sequence of landscapes. If you look carefully, you will see the sharp zig-zags of the Libeskind building appear in the garden landscaping in a gentler variation.

From the glass courtyard, you walk out into an archway of cascading wisteria boughs, under which tables have been set for dining. If you're here simply to while away the hours, though, you can move on to a flat, cool green space under the shade of plane trees.

Or, on a gentle slope overlooking the light-flooded glass courtyard designed by Daniel Libeskind, you can spread out a blanket and picnic lunch (both provided by the Restaurant Liebermanns) under cherry trees. If you can tear yourself away from this spot, move further up where the garden becomes a series of terraced slopes, leading to a fountain. The slopes are dotted with the red lawn chairs of those who have sought solitude, a view and a book for company.

You can bring a brown bag lunch, but if you feel like splurging on a picnic for two, leave it to Julia Tannhof, chef of the Restaurant Liebermanns. She will pack you a delicious picnic basket with hummus, falafel, grilled mushrooms, aubergine caviar, couscous, tabouleh, tahini and Kalamata olives. The basket includes her special mint lemonade, a picnic blanket, plates and silverware.

From June to August, the Jewish Museum's summer cultural program (Kultursommer) takes place in the garden, and its Jazz im Garten Sunday matinee series is a local favorite. But I find the best time to be here is September, when the music lovers and picnicking families have left, and the garden is quiet -- a wonderful spot in which to read, have a late lunch or simply hold on to the last of the late summer sunshine.

The Jewish Museum is on Lindenstr. 9-14 in 10969 Berlin, Kreuzberg and is open from 10 am to 8 pm Tuesday-Sunday, and 10 am to 10 pm on Monday. Public transportation: U1 to Hallesches Tor or U6 to Kochstr. or Bus M29, M41 or 248.

The Restaurant Liebermanns' picnic basket for two costs 23.50 Euros, and must be ordered at least 24 hours in advance (Tel. +49 (0)30 25 939 76). You can add a bottle of wine at an extra charge. You do not need a museum ticket in order to enter the garden. After going through security, make your way toward the restaurant, which leads out into the garden.
For more information go to www.jmberlin.de

Discover Berlin's Historic Buildings

2009-09-11T22:20:00.298+02:00

One of my all-time favorite events that takes place every year across the country kicks off this weekend: Open Day of Historic Buildings ("Tag des Offenen Denkmals"). Since Berlin has at least 320 historic sites, it has extended the Open Day to two days over the weekend (Saturday, September 12 and Sunday, September 13).

This is your chance to take in some spectacular buildings and sites, some of which are not open to the public through the rest of the year. Several offer free tours by architects and historians who fill us in on the stories behind these buildings and spaces, and their novel transformations.

The Theme for this year's event is "Genuss" or Pleasure. Of the 320 Berlin sites open to the public this weekend, over a hundred fall into the category of Pleasure/Leisure. Here are my Top Five Favorites.

Wading in Culture
One: Stadtbad Steglitz, the beautiful Art Nouveau public pool with its high light-filled dome and mosaic ornamentations. The mosaic centerpiece in the sauna area uses clusters of tiny golden mosaic tiles while cast iron moldings in the shape of sea horses and sea shells clamber around the tops of columns.

A Historic Preservation site since 1982, the Stadtbad Steglitz closed in 2002 because it needed extensive renovation. To the rescue came investor Gabriele Berger, who bought the site for a symbolic sum of one Euro and agreed to find the several million Euros it will take to renovate and restore it to its original use. In the meantime she has converted it into an atmosphere-filled venue for theater or music performances, dances or parties.

Forget the XXL Tub of Popcorn
Two: The Astor Film Lounge at Kurfürstendamm 225, a cinema theater with a touch of class. Its history goes back to the late 40s when it opened as the Kino im Kindl, or KiKi. Restructurings made in the 1950s have survived till today, giving the theater a wonderful retro feel. From the 60s till very recently, it was the Film Palast. But just about a year ago, film buff and entrepreneur Hans Joachim Flebbe decided that if he applied a new concept to the 1950s theater, he could create the ideal experience for finicky cineasts.

At the Astor you can ask that your car be valet parked, have a welcome cocktail at the bar, sink into adjustable leather reclining seats, order champagne and finger food at your own private table and enjoy state-of-the-art sound, lighting and projection technology. Bliss!

The GDR's Premiere Cinema
Three: Kino International at Karl Marx Allee 33, the 1960s cinema theater that screened legendary film premieres in the GDR and even today is a favorite for premiere showings and Berlinale screenings.

Located opposite Cafe Moskau, which used to be the watering hole for GDR party members, the theater has been a Historic Preservation site since 1995. It is well worth a visit any time for its monumental post-Stalinist structure, grand foyer with crystal chandeliers, twin staircases, upholstered seating and sequined curtains. But a visit this weekend gives you a grand opportunity to discover more about its past.

Lakeside Splendor
Four: Schloss Wannsee, comprising six late-nineteenth century buildings on the shores of Lake Wannsee, including a picturesque half-timbered villa. Originally a recreation spot for sailboat-owners. the villa was used as a restaurant and the other buildings as boathouse, summer kitchen, restaurant and dance hall. This year extensive renovations are restoring all six buildings back to their turn-of-the-century glory. Since Schloss Wannsee is under private ownership, this is a rare chance for the public to view its charming interiors.

Historic Villa-and-Garden Ensembles
Five: an ensemble of three villa and garden landscapes planned by Mies van der Rohe in Zehlendorf in the early 1900s. Now used by the Parzival Schule, the three villas -- Haus Werner, Haus Perl and the Garten Haus -- are usually closed to the public, but this weekend Berliners are treated to a well-researched tour through the buildings and grounds, each of the three representing a distinct architectural style: neo-Classical, Bauhaus and Landhaus (or European country house).

Stadtbad Steglitz is at Bergstr. 90 (U-Bahnhof Schloßstraßse or U/S-Bahnhof Rathaus Steglitz). Open this Saturday and Sunday, 10 am to 6 pm. More information at www.stadtbad-steglitz.de
The Astor Film Lounge is at Kurfürstendamm 225 (U-Bahnhof Kurfürstendamm). Open this Saturday and Sunday, 10 am to 12 midnight. More information at www.astor-filmlounge.de
Kino International is at Karl-Marx-Allee 33 (U-Bahnhof Schillingstraße). Open this Saturday for three tours at 11:30 am, 1 pm and 2:30 pm. There will be an additional tour next Saturday, September 19 at 12 pm. More inf ormation at www.yorck.de
Schloss Wannsee is at Kronprinzessinweg 21 (S-Bahnhof Nikolassee). Open this Sunday from 10 am to 3 pm.
The Mies van der Rohe Villas are at Quermatenweg 6 (U-Bahnhof Krumme Lanke). Open this Sunday from 10 am to 2 pm. The villas are presently owned by the Parzival Schule. Their information is at www.waldorf.net/therapeutikum

Art through the Keyhole

2009-08-29T12:14:00.152+02:00

Viewing art through a keyhole: the "Bilderträume" exhibition of Surrealist art at the Neue Nationalgalerie plays with this motif, and posters across the city depict a keyhole against a black backdrop through which your eye glimpses a tantalizing sliver of a Max Ernst, Magritte or Delvaux painting.

Leonor Fini, "Two Women"(1939). ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst Bonn 2009

In the exhibition's publicity materials, the painting chosen to represent its theme, especially its preoccupation with dreams and fantasies, is this one by Leonor Fini, where the viewer's eye is drawn directly to the act of looking through the keyhole.

The image resonates with viewers because the "Bilderträume" exhibition reveals the private collection of Ulla and Heiner Pietzsch to a museum public in Berlin for the very first time. The Pietzsches, both long-time residents of Berlin, lovingly collected these works over a period of 30 years, focusing on Surrealist artists. They acquired the works not only of the great Surrealists such as Dali and Magritte, but also lesser known artists such as Fini or Kurt Seligmann.

Besides paintings, the collection includes sculptures, photographs, documents and books. Till now, these were only to be seen in the spectacular Dahlem home of Ulla and Heiner Pietzsch, which the couple planned and built around their beloved collection. Only once before had there been a public viewing: in Dresden, the city where Heiner Pietzsch was born.

This is an outstanding collection. We see, for instance that Dripping-Painting, a technique we have come to associate with Jackson Pollock, was really the inspiration of Max Ernst, an artist whom the Pietzsches had met in Hannover in the 1970s, and whose works are represented here in greater number than any other single artist. We see, too, a self-portrait by Frida Kahlo, an artist whose works are not included in any major German collection.

By drawing a line from the European Surrealists to the Abstract Expressionists in New York in the 1950s, the Pietzsch collection shows us how artists in the two traditions drew on each other's ideas. And by including the work of artists such as Leonor Fini, Dorothea Tanning and Meret Oppenheim, it brings to light the work of women artists in the genre, less frequently exhibited.

In the end, by juxtaposing works from the Pietzsche collection with those in the museum's permanent collection, the exhibition highlights just how perfectly the one could complement and complete the other.

Here, then, is yet another variation on the meaning of "Bilderträume" (literally, Dreams of Images): Now that the Neue Nationalgalerie might acquire more exhibition space in the Kulturforum once the Gemäldegalerie moves to the Museum Island, could it be dreaming of bringing the brilliant Pietzsche collection into its fold?

Rene Magritte, "The Magician's Apprentice" (1926). ⓒ VG Bild-Kunst Bonn 2009

"Bilderträume" runs till 22 November 2009 at the Neue Nationalgalerie, Potsdamerstr. 50, 10785 Berlin. Tickets are 10 EUR (5 Eur reduced price), and audio guides in German and English are available for 5 EUR (3.50 EUR reduced price). Public transportation: U and S-Bahn: Potsdamer Platz, Bus M48 to Kulturforum or Bus 200 to Potsdamer Platz. More information is at: www.bildertraeume.org

Best of the Wurst

2009-08-22T20:07:00.052+02:00

Berlin's newest museum, which opened on Saturday, August 15, is dedicated to the city's most iconic fast food: the currywurst.

Photo: dpa

Martin Löwe, curator of the German Currywurst Museum and initiator of the project, began developing the idea four years ago. In the meantime, five million Euros of private investment have gone into making this fast food icon into a cultural institution. The 1100 square-meter museum is located just next to another tourist magnet, Checkpoint Charlie.

For 60 years this favorite Berliner snack -- fried pork sausage chopped into bite-sized chunks, doused with ketchup , sprinkled with curry powder and dumped onto a paper plate -- has been consumed at the rate of 70 million a year in Berlin alone (800 million in Germany).

The Secret behind Currywurst

Hamburg may contest Berlin's claim to being the first city to produce this sausage delicacy, but for Berliners the case is clear-cut. The inventor of currywurst was Herta Heuwer, a shop assistant who lived in Berlin's post-war British sector.

In a city still ravaged by the war, Heuwer bought a food stand for 35 Marks and converted it into a kiosk. On a rainy day in September 1949, when nary a customer showed up, she experimented with ingredients brought into the city by British soldiers: tomato puree, Worcestershire sauce and curry powder. The next day she sold the world's first currywurst. Heuwer (and Berlin) never looked back.

By the 50s and 60s the Berlin currywurst was so popular that Heuwer employed an entire staff and patented the recipe for the sauce (under the name "Chillup"). You can still see a metal plaque at the corner of Kant and Kaiser-Friedrich-Strasse in Charlottenburg, marking the spot where Heuwer first put up her kiosk. The original recipe with its 12 different spices, though, remains a secret.

A Tribute to Currywurst

An entire section is dedicated to Herta Heuwer and the origins of the currywurst. But there's more.

At the entrance, visitors can stand behind the counter of a make-believe currywurst stand and have their picture taken. Later, they can marvel at giant ketchup drops from the ceiling, plop down on a leather Wurst- sofa to watch TV-clips on the theme of currywurst, listen to pop songs featuring currywurst lyrics emanating from handsets in the shape of ketchup bottles, or study a map showing locations of Berlin's currywurst stands marked with little forks.

Photo: dpa

Currywurst Disneyland

You can also pick up trivia about currywurst sales around the world, learn about currywurst variations, follow the history of fast food, watch Grace Lee's documentary film "Best of the Wurst," prepare a virtual currywurst, or peek inside the refrigerators of various social "types" (the single twenty-something male, the two-children family, the gourmet foodie, etc.) to discover the role of Berlin's most famous fast food in each.

Photo: dpa

If the entrance price of 11 Euros hasn't been steep enough, (note that for one Euro more you can get a combination-ticket for all the fantastic exhibitions at the Museum Island) you can also buy currywurst junk at the exit: a T-Shirt that reads "Don't Worry --- be Curry" or a soft toy sausage (29.90 EUR).

"The museum is a tribute to a cultural phenomenon," said museum director Birgit Breloh. "Our aim is to highlight all the various dimensions of the currywurst." A lofty goal. But all this seems to me like a kind of Currywurst Disneyland. Me, I'd rather go down to Curry 36 in Kreuzberg and get the real thing.

Photo: dpa

The Currywurst Museum is at Schützenstr. 70, 10117 Berlin Mitte (U6 to Kochstr.) and is open daily from 10 am to 10 pm. Tickets are 11 Eur (reduced fee: 7 EUR). More information is at www.currywurstmuseum.de

State of Control: Art Installation at the Stasi Headquarters

2009-06-27T14:47:00.037+02:00

Normannenstrasse 19 in Berlin-Lichtenberg. The address is enough to send a chill down the spine: till 1989 it belonged to the headquarters of the MfS, the Ministry for State Security, or Stasi.

Here, in a complex of grim-looking Plattenbau concrete buildings, a well-oiled administrative machine employed a staff of eighty thousand to keep the population of the DDR under constant surveillance. In January 1990, when the German government authorized the destruction of Stasi files, civil rights groups stormed the complex. Graffiti on the walls ("Never again the SED Mafia" says one) still bears witness to the event. Since then, the building has been closed to the public, its starkly neon-lit hallways and meeting rooms echoing with silence.

For the first time since 1989, the building is once again open to the public. Stripped of all furniture but still haunted by its past, these large silent rooms were the perfect space for Thomas Kilpper's art installation "State of Control."

"I was immediately inspired by the space," says Kilpper, an artist and sculptor from Stuttgart. "I found exactly what I was looking for." Kilpper converted the 800-square-meter floor of what was once the ministry's dining hall into a giant printing block. Etched into the linoleum floor are 92 images of divided Germany, for which Kilpper used a kind of woodcutting technique. First, he projected photographs onto the yellow/green linoleum, then cut into the outlines of the negative images. Finally, he ran a black-ink roller over the surface, leaving the non-print surface in the original linoleum color.

The effect is striking. The images have been cut into the floor just as they have been sharply etched in the nation's memory. The three underlying themes are clear: state security, resistance and terrorism. Only the lines of differentiation between them are deliberately left blurred.

Silvio Berlusconi and John Heartfield. Photo: Jens Ziehe. Courtesy Neuer Berliner Kunstverein

I was lucky enough to visit with a historian friend who helped fill several gaps in my knowledge. For the most part, viewers are left to "read" images on their own. The floor map that accompanies the exhibition is difficult to follow, and the images don't have a chronological or thematic sequence. Kilpper does not guide you with any kind of commentary. It is as if the artist says: See in your mind's eye that press photo from the 70s. Remember that image from a documentary film made twenty years ago. Or the popular movie released two years ago. Or the news headlines from four weeks ago. Remember and connect.

Willi Brandt and Günter Guillaume. Photo: Jens Ziehe. Courtesy Neuer Berliner Kunstverein

A Surreal Portrait Gallery

Before we knew it, we were treading over the first of Kilpper's linoleum-cuts: Erich Mielke, Minister of State Security and head of the Stasi till 1989, clinking champagne glasses with Walter Ulbricht and Erich Honecker. Toward the middle of the room is the high-ranking Stasi spy Günter Guillaume whispering into the ear of Chancellor Willy Brandt as though giving him the Judas kiss. Then there is French philosopher Michel Foucault giving a lecture at the Technische Universität Berlin in 1976; directly below him, an idyllic picnic scene in the DDR. Across from the picnickers are the protesters against the Pershing missiles; next to them, Erich Mielke again, this time dancing with his wife in the ballroom in the very building in which we stand.

Kilpper lets the images, drawn from national and press archives as well as from his own private collection, cluster in an intuitive rather than ordered way: "The whole constellation emerged like a labyrinthine blackberry bush," he said.

Just about four weeks ago, the case of Benno Ohnesorg, the student shot down in the 1968 demonstrations, was making national headlines when it was discovered that Karl-Heinz Kurras, the West Berlin police officer who shot him, was a Stasi agent. Clearly, Kilpper's themes reach from history into the present. In the end, though, this is more than a collection of images having to do with just the Stasi. "Instead," says Kilpper, " I wanted to show the fine line everywhere between resistance and terrorism."

While at Normannenstraße 19, don't overlook the opportunity of visiting the Stasi Museum, also in the same complex. The exhibition features a lot of explanatory text (all in German), but the still-palpable atmosphere of the powerful machinery of repression needs no translation. Mielke's office, the canteen and the conference room have all been preserved in their original state, and there are rooms full of operative technology for spying -- including a hidden camera in a birdhouse.

"State of Control" runs till 26 July 2009 at the former Ministerium für Staatssicherheit der DDR (MfS) at Normannenstraße 19, Berlin-Lichtenberg. Admission is free and staff on duty are happy to answer questions. Public Transportation: U5 to Magdalenenstr.

The Stasi Museum is at Ruschestraße 103, Haus 1, 10365 Berlin. Admission is 4 EUR, reduced fee 3,50 EUR. Open Monday to Friday from 11:00 am to 6 pm, on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays from 2 pm to 6 pm.

Visions of our Time: Tenth Anniversary of the Deutsche Börse Photography Collection

2009-06-25T14:46:00.040+02:00

Nikita Kruktunov and Rufina Muharanova, Omsk, May 2005. Picture: Simon Roberts/Courtesy Art Collection Deutsche Börse

"Visions of our Time" at C/O Berlin celebrates ten years of the Art Collection Deutsche Börse and features the work of the 4 nominees for the 2009 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize.

The prizewinning and shortlisted photographs take pride of place in the exhibition, but the more interesting section, at least in terms of technique and composition, may be the other half of the show: a group of 100 of the more than 700 works in the Deutsche Börse's collection of contemporary photography.

Filmic Haikus

Paul Graham is winner of the £30,000 award for his series named a shimmer of possibility after a collection of Chekov's short stories. Graham made an extended road trip across the US between 2004-06, taking pictures of everyday life. What interested him was not the one defining moment but sequences that capture simple human activities -- somebody lighting a cigarette, cutting grass or waiting for a bus.

Graham's photographs are sequential shots of these single activities, and Graham likes to call them "haikus" rather than narratives. Not much is happening in Graham's shots. They are often ad hoc pictures, sometimes badly lit, as in the sequence of the (homeless?) person selling a bunch of flowers, and mostly about no more than "being there."

Archivist, Detective, Activist

Kuwaiti artist Emily Jacir is one of the three other nominees for the prize, and her featured work is "Material for a Film," a multimedia installation documenting the assassination of the Palestinian intellectual Wael Zuwaiter by Israeli agents in Rome in 1972.

Jacir arranges photographs, texts and objects to piece together the story, and some stop you in your tracks -- such as the copy of the 1001 Arabian Nights Zuwaiter was carrying in his pocket when he was shot. Lodged in the cover is a bullet, the only one which did not pierce Zuwaiter's chest.

Still, you can't help wondering what Jacir's work is doing in a photo exhibition. She is much more of an archivist than a photographer.

White Tiger

The White Tiger is the most well known of Taryn Simon's picture-and-text series entitled "American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar." Simon, another nominee for the prize, concentrates on images of contemporary America that tap into the hidden or darker sides of the culture, a kind of nationwide Discomfort Zone.

The white tiger (Kenny) at the Arkansas zoo is a product of selective inbreeding, and he is physically and mentally malformed. Like Kenny, all of Simon's subjects are fascinating: the contraband room of the customs section of JFK Airport; a Braille edition of Playboy; a female patient undergoing hymenoplasty, a surgical procedure which masks the loss of virginity; and a bird's eye view of drums of nuclear waste under water. In the end, though, Simon's subjects may be more memorable than her use of the medium.

Adam and Eve in Central Park

Tod Papageorge is my favorite of the four shortlisted artists. His black-and-white series shot over twenty five years in Central Park is called "Passing Through Eden" and is based on the first six chapters of Genesis.

Through Papageorge's lens, Central Park is transformed into a prelapsarian world. It's a familiar world (still recognizably New York of the 60s and 70s) but also strangely magical. As you walk by the pictures in the first half of the series it is not difficult to decode a sequence of Biblical references. The narrative then continues to unfold in the second half, and Papageorge's photographs seem able to encompass all of human life within the boundaries of the Park: its innocence, beauty, ugliness and mystery, but also its humor.

Picture: Tod Papageorge/Courtesy Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York

I returned a couple of times to one particular photo -- in perfect symmetrical proportions -- of three men on a park bench. The first is straddled by his girlfriend in an amorous embrace, the second is lost in his newspaper, the third is trying to decipher something on a slip of paper -- a shopping list? an incomprehensible bill?

On the upper floor are the 100 photographs from the rest of the collection, among which are some unforgettable images. I'll mention just three. First, the striking portraits of Seydou Keita, the photographer from Bamako, Mali, who never went to college, never saw the works of photographers outside his country, and never had a teacher. His clients, the simple people of his hometown in the 1950s, lined up outside his studio because Keita's portraits made them beautiful, and he gave each a touch of West African tradition.

Then, the portrait series called "Heads" by Philip-Lorca di Corcia, who marked a spot on the ground at Times Square, New York, mounted a camera and telephoto lens a long distance away, then released the shutter every time someone he found interesting walked over the spot. From the swirling life around the Square, the camera seizes his subjects while the background melts away, and the viewer sees a cross-section of New Yorkers as individuals in a moment of unawareness.

And finally, the selection of photos from British photographer Simon Robert's series called "Motherland," the result of his yearlong exploration of Russia, documenting the lives of local people through a vast sweep of the country. The proud gaze of the two young competition dancers from Siberia, the girl in a peacock blue dress, is one of the images that stayed with me.

"Visions of our Time" is at C/O Berlin, Oranienburger Straße 35/36, 10117 Berlin (S Oranienburger Straße) and runs till 19. July, 2009. Open everyday from 11 am to 8 pm. Tickets cost 7 Euro (reduced: 5 Euro). See www.co-berlin.com for more details.

Extravagantly Newton

2009-06-15T14:56:00.008+02:00

The Helmut Newton Foundation presents a Larger-than-Life Collection at the Museum for Photography

XXXL

Helmut Newton SUMO, published in 1999 by Benedikt Taschen and presented by the Helmut Newton Foundation, is not exactly a coffee-table photography book. Rather it is a photography book with its own coffee-table.

Newton and Taschen with one of the first copies of SUMMO in the courtyard of the publishing house, 1999. Photo by ⓒ Alice Springs

The gigantic 464-page book weighs 66 pounds and needs a custom-made metal holder, designed for SUMO at a cost of $15,000 by Phillip Starcke. Taschen originally introduced the book as a limited edition of 10,000, signed by Newton, but this September a more handy edition will appear on bookshelves for those who could not afford the stand.

To mark the tenth anniversary of SUMO, all its 394 photographs are on display for the first time at Berlin's Museum of Photography. The pictures in the book appear as framed pages: the fashion photography for Vogue, the nudes, portraits and advertisements. All the classic Newtons are here: the striking Big Nudes; the domestic nudes; the celebrity portraits: Elizabeth Taylor half-submerged in a swimming pool, a resplendent greeen parrot perched on one finger; Versace unclothed; Charlotte Rampling sinuously draped on a baroque dining table.

Newton's photographs read like a thriller. They are set in basements, empty streets, anonymous lobbies or palatial European interiors. His beautiful women wear treacherous stiletto heels, cruel steel leg braces, handcuffs, or transparent trench coats, and there is mysterious, psycho-sexual sinister drama behind each shot.

Villa d'Este

Arranged in three halls in the imposing interior of the Museum of Photography (once the casino for the Landwehr officers), the extravagant sweep of the exhibition reminds us how many iconic photographic images Newton produced in his lifetime.

Parallel to the main exhibition is the smaller "Three Boys from Pasadena," featuring Mark Arbeit, George Holtz and Just Loomis. All three were students at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California in the 1970s and later became Newton's assistants.

Don't miss the excellent documentary film in the video room on the making of Helmut Newton SUMO .

Helmut Newton SUMO runs till 31 January 2010 at the Museum for Photography, Jebensstraße 2, 10623 Berlin. Take public transportation to U Zoologischer Garten, then take the Jebensstraße exit from the station. The museum is open every day, except Monday, from 10:00 am to 6:00 pm. and tickets cost 8 EUR (reduced cost: 4 EUR).

"To the Green Forest": the Jagdschloss Grunewald

2009-06-01T09:14:00.018+02:00

Berlin's oldest palace, the Renaissance-era royal hunting lodge known as the Jagdschloss Grunewald, opened on May 28 after almost three years of renovation.

The Jagdschloss has opened with an art exhibition called "Von Angesicht zu Angesicht," featuring 300 years of Berlin portrait painting (17th-19th c). This returns the building to its 1932 role, when art historian Georg Poensgen first transformed the royal quarters into exhibition space for Berlin portrait art and paintings by Old German and Dutch Masters.

The paintings are mostly unremarkable, and not till the Lucas Cranach paintings that belong here return in 2011 (beginning October, they are showing at Schloss Charlottenburg in an exhibition called "Cranach and the Art of the Renaissance under the Hohenzollerns) will there be an art lover's reason to visit.

For now, a better reason to visit the Jagdschloss -- and it is well worth a visit -- is for its setting and interiors, both a part of Berlin's architectural and archaeological history.

Getting There

The path through the Grunewald forest to the Jagdschloss must be one of the loveliest approaches to a museum. The ground is soft underfoot, tree branches rustle overhead and the only people you will meet are walkers, joggers and dog owners.

If you want to savor a bit of history as well, you will breathe deep and revel in treading ground that was once the hunting environs of the Hohenzollern royalty. In 1542, when Prince Joachim II had the palace built, he called it simply "Zum Gruenen Walde" or (in a clumsy translation) "to the green forest."

In summer the deep green foliage keeps the palace from sight till you actually get there. It has a modest exterior, this white and brick-red building on the side of the placid Grunewald lake. But for Berliners, it has a special significance. Over 460 years old, it is the only remaining Renaissance-era palace in the city since the the Berliner Schloss was destroyed in 1950.

There's History in these Rooms

In 1973, construction work in the Große Hofstube (Great Hall) revealed painted wooden ceilings behind the Baroque moldings, and 15th c. arches which had been walled in by Baroque-era architects. Thanks to archaeological reconstruction, the beautiful Renaissance wooden ceilings and arches are now back in view.

In other interior rooms, the baroque moldings from the time of King Friedrich I (1705-06) have been retained. And in the exhibition rooms you sense the spirit of the 1930s: the clean functionality of white walls and oxblood red hardwood floors. The fresh blue of the lake visible through large windows on each floor pervades the atmosphere of these interiors.

Sunset over Berlin: The Lake Terrace

What a pity that the viewer is denied access to the neo-baroque lake terrace, which once led directly from the castle, and which has also been handsomely restored. The reason? Dogs, says the guard on duty. We had to cordon it off to keep the dogs from using it as a diving board.

The lake terrace in summer is an ideal spot to enjoy the natural beauty of the Grunewald. "Here you can experience the most beautiful sunset over Berlin," rhapsodizes Hartmut Dorgerloh, General Director of the Palace Foundation, and I believe him. The terrace is open for a glass of wine after special events, but how about making it available for ticket holders to the museum?

Jagdschloss Grunewald is at Hüttenweg 100, 14193 Berlin.

The Jagdschloss is open every day (except Monday) from May to October, from 10 am to 6 pm, and from November to April on Saturday, Sundays and holidays from 10 am to 4 pm.

The exhibition "Von Angesicht zu Angesicht runs from 28.05.09 to 31.10.10.

Reaching there:

By car: To Hüttenweg up to the parking lot for Forsthaus Paulsborn, then walk about 400 m.

By public transportation: U-Bahn Dahlem Dorf or S-Bahn Zehlendorf, then with Bus X83 to the corner of Clayallee/Königin Luise Strasse, then a 10 minute walk through the Grunewald.

A green trail for those who prefer to hike: From U-Bahn Podbielski Allee, take Im Dol to Messel Park, cut through Messel Park till Pücklerstr. Take a left and keep straight till you enter the Grunewald. Follow signs to Jagdschloss (about 30 min).

For more information: www.spsg.de

60 Years-60 Works at the Martin Gropius Bau

2009-05-23T20:19:00.020+02:00

Today, Berlin celebrates the sixtieth birthday of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany, and the city is having a grand birthday bash at the Brandenburger Tor, where half a million people and celebrities from the worlds of politics, journalism, music and entertainment have gathered.

Happy Birthday at the Martin Gropius Bau

If you've missed the party at the Brandenburger Tor, you can still take part in a quieter celebration at the Martin Gropius Bau - a celebration of the 60 years of the Federal Republic as reflected in the works of 60 artists.

Elephants and Rhinoceros

The exhibition, which opened on May 1, has been controversial. Sixty years, 60 works. How can one work speak for an entire year in the often tumultuous six decades between 1949 and 2009? Besides, railed the leftist media and some vitriolic critics, why did the curators leave out former East German artists (except those who fled to the BRD) and once again throw up a dividing wall between East and West?

Simple, said curator Peter Iden, at a roundtable discussion I attended last week at the Martin Gropius Bau. This is an exhibition of art in the Federal Republic. To demand a more inclusive approach is like having the rhinoceros complain they are not featured in an exhibition on elephants.

"Sechzig Jahre-Sechzig Werke"

German media have played up the irony of housing an exhibition that underscores the East/West divide in the the Martin-Gropius Bau, the beautiful Renaissance-style exhibition hall that stands on a site across which the Berlin Wall once cut.

But regardless of the political debate, "Sechzig Jahre-Sechzig Werke" is still a landmark retrospective and a collection of wonderful pieces.

The works do not march in a straight chronological line (as one might expect): art from different years are placed in counterpoint. Other lines, too, are blurred: the lines between photography and painting in Gerhard Richter's mysterious "Tiger" or between video images and the medieval art of woodcuts in Christine Baumgartner's intriguing "Luftbild."

Besides paintings there are sculptures, installations, graphic art and photography. Limiting the choice to 60 works means, of course, that the choice is subjective -- and exactly this keeps the viewer curious and questioning. An evenly balanced, politically correct selection would have been far less interesting.

Not a History Parade

This isn't a parade of "representational" works, with easy one-to-one relationships between the work of art and the year in which it appears. That, too, makes it more interesting.

Chronology is worked out elsewhere: in six interactive screens that juxtapose a time line against paintings and their commentary -- and in 60 short films that show historic footage from six decades of political, social and cultural events. It's up to you as viewer to carry these images in your head as you move back out into the exhibition spaces.

Sechzig Jahre. Sechzig Werke shows every day (including holidays) till June 14, 2009, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the Martin Gropius Bau, Niederkirchner Straße 7, 10963 Berlin. U-2 or S-Bahn 1, 2, or 25 to Potsdamer Platz. Admission is 7 EUR (reduced fee: 5 EUR). More information is at www.gropiusbau.de or www.60jahre-60werke.de

The exhibition is an initiative of the Foundation for Art and Culture, Bonn and supported by the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

NB "Kunst und Kalter Krieg 1945-89" (Art in the time of the Cold War), curated by Stephanie Barron, chief curator of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, opens in Berlin's Deutsches Historisches Museum on October 3, 2009. In direct contrast to "60 Jahre-60 Werke" this exhibition focuses on the intrinsic relationship between art on either side of the former West/East divide. The exhibition is part of the commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Thirty Minutes of Heaven

2009-05-11T00:06:00.004+02:00

Sacred music in Berlin's historic churches offers another opportunity to hear great music for free. One of the most beautiful weekly series is the NoonSong every Saturday at 12:00 noon at the Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz.

Sirventes

Eight professional singers who call themselves Sirventes render heavenly harmonies, mostly Renaissance and sometimes Romantic choral music, embedded in a thirty-minute sung liturgy. On Saturday, May 9, Sirventes performed choral music by J.H. Schein and Mendelssohn Bartholdy.

Just outside the church, at the Hohenzollern Platz, the weekly market is in full swing. Asparagus is in season, as are strawberries, and bunches of lilacs sit in tubs of water at the flower stalls. Inside, the sound of fruit sellers' calls ebbs away as shoppers, their baskets still trailing green asparagus tips and pollen smudges from lilies, settle meditatively in their pews. The first notes of Dubois' Toccata ring out from the organ loft.

NoonSong

Sirventes is led by Stefan Schuck, professor of choral music at the Universität der Künste, and NoonSong is his brainchild. The inspiration for the NoonSong liturgy, he explains, comes from the "Stundengebet" or liturgy for the hour, practiced as long ago as the fifth century in the Benedictine tradition.

"The aim of NoonSong," Schuck says, "is to weave together the beauty of the liturgy with the beauty of the music and the text, and to open the heart and ear of the listener. NoonSong embeds the music in its original context, so it is at once concert and liturgy. This is what makes it a different experience from, say, a concert in the Kammermusiksaal in the Philharmonie."

Weekly performances of NoonSong will continue till the end of May, but after that, its future is uncertain. Lack of funds makes the project difficult to sustain, and it may have to cut back on the number of performances. It would be a shame if this beautiful Berlin tradition were to die out.

Performances are every Saturday at 12:00 till the end of May, and entrance is free although you can give a donation at the door to support the project. The Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz is at U Hohenzollernplatz (exit: Düsseldorferstr).

The last of the regular weekly performances (May 30) will feature choral works by Kenneth Leighton, Michael Praetorius and Heinrich Schütz.

More information is at www.noonsong.de

Great Music on a Low Budget

2009-04-23T15:37:00.001+02:00

Berlin's three opera houses, five major orchestras, two music conservatories and dozens of jazz clubs provide world class music every day. Best of all, some of this wonderful music is available to avid concert goers at little or no cost.

Lunch Concerts

The Berliner Philharmonie's free Lunch Concerts on Tuesdays at 1 p.m. are no longer a well-kept secret. In fact, the number of visitors to this weekly event has increased so dramatically that since 14 April 2009 the Philharmonie has had to introduce a new chip-regulated entrance to make sure it doesn't run afoul of safety standards.

On Tuesday, 21 April, the program featured Daniel Barenboim and his son Michael Barenboim performing Wilhelm Furtwängler's Sonate für Violine und Klavier Nr 1 d-Moll (1935).

Music lovers throng the foyer, stairways and first floor, the lunchtime version of coveted balcony seats. They're all here: students trailing in across the street from the Staatsbibliothek (state library) ; business men and women on lunch break toting laptop cases; tourists putting away their Berlin Made Easy guidebooks in which they've plotted out the rest of the day; even a group of wide-eyed pre-schoolers accompanied by two mothers. They belong to a parent's initiative in Charlottenburg, one of them explains, and their idea is to bring three to six-year-olds in contact with classical music, live and up close.

The audience is rapt. For fifty minutes a sonata for violin and piano suspends all activities in the middle of their day. The morning's tasks are done, the afternoon's still to come, but for now, music knits up the ravell'd sleeves of care.

When it comes time for the last applause, members of the audience add their own creative touch. At the concert's end, a couple of listeners "rapunzel" down bouquets of roses in a shopping bag on a rope from the top stair, and Pamela Rosenberg, artistic director of the Philharmonie, plays along by unpacking the bag with a flourish for the Barenboims.

Lunch Concerts are free and take place every Tuesday at 1 p.m. in the foyer of the Philharmonie at Herbert-von-Karajanstr. 1, 10785 Berlin. The next Lunch Concert takes place on Tuesday, 28 April at 1 p.m. A buffet lunch accompanies each concert and is served till 15 minutes before the beginning of the concert and again at the end. The program for the month is at www.berliner-philharmoniker.de

Casual Concerts

Leave the black dress and pearls at home when setting off for the Causal Concert series by the Deutsche Symphonie Orchester (DSO). The audience dresses down as do the conductor and musicians. The Casual Concert series is the initiative of the DSO's principal conductor Ingo Metzmacher, who both conducts and speaks about the music informally with the musicians and the audience.

Berlin audiences learned with sadness that the charismatic conductor will soon be giving up his post at the DSO. Earlier this month Metzmacher officially announced that he would not be extending his current contract, which runs to the end of the 2009/10 season. The reason, he said, was that he found unacceptable the financial constraints put upon the orchestra that would make layoffs inevitable.

All the more reason to make sure you catch one of the upcoming concerts in this series, before Metzmacher's departure. Concerts begin a half hour later than usual (at 8:30 p.m.) and there is a run for the seats as soon as the doors open since all seats, including the best, cost a flat 15 EUR. The concert lasts for about an hour, but if the evening seems too short, you can accompany the DSO to the After Concert Lounge at the 40seconds Club right after the performance.

The DSO has three Casual Concerts this season. They each cost 15 EUR and take place at the Philharmonie at Herbert-von-Karajanstr. 1, 10785 Berlin . Performances begin at 8:30 p.m. and are about an hour long. Entry to the After Concert Lounge is 3 EUR with the concert ticket. The next Casual Concert is on Tuesday, 19 May and features compositions from the year 1909. Program details are at www.dso-berlin.de