Every two years, the European Month of Photography transforms Berlin into a showcase of photographic art. In a hundred exhibitions spread across the city, well-known names such as Viviane Sassen at Fotografiska are joined by Instagram favorites such as Sam Youkilis at C/O. The best way to take in the diversity is to stroll from district to district, from museum to project space, and from gallery to off-space. We start our tour at the Academy of Arts in the Hansaviertel — the cultural institute will become the festival headquarters — from today (27.03.2025), talks, film screenings and an opening party will take place here throughout the weekend. The group exhibition what stands between us. forms the centerpiece of this year’s photo festival. What can an image achieve in the face of deepfakes and social media when democratic structures are collapsing around the world? Quite a lot, if you ask the twenty artists coming together at the Academy. Tomorrow we move on to the West, to the Bröhan Museum. From Friday (28.02.), the museum will commemorate Will McBride, who captured Berlin’s optimism in the sixties. The American, who came to Germany as a decommissioned G.I., was right in the middle of the young city with his Leica — at demos and parties, when a new attitude to life emerged between the ruins of the post-war period.
While McBride’s pictures sparkle with euphoria, Louis Roth‘s photographs (from 06.03.) at Haus 1 in Kreuzberg exude a strange calm for a weekend, although he was also present at the birth of a new city. The graduate of the Ostkreuzschule für Fotografie traveled to the new administrative capital of Egypt, which is being built in the middle of the desert. The planned city is supposed to relieve Cairo but nobody wants to live there because the rent is too high. While the ministries gradually relocate to New Cairo, the population is left behind. Roth captures incredible images of this ghostly megaproject between superlatives and vacancy. People are also missing in the works of Anja Nitz and Sinta Werner. In spatial sculptures and photographs, the two artists explore the question of where the body remains when our screen time increases. At Villa Heike in Lichtenberg, you feel like you’re in a hall of mirrors — you are confronted with uniform spaces. What is in front of you remains diffuse. Meanwhile, Ana Zibelnik and Jakob Ganslmeier aim to make climate change tangible from Friday (28.02.). At the Slovenian Cultural Information Center in Kreuzberg, the duo will be focusing on young people, those on whose shoulders the consequences of the crisis fall. Even if images cannot change the situation, they help us understand it and feel less alone in it. Or, to paraphrase the EMOP exhibition, they are bridges that overcome what stands between us.
Text: Laura Storfner / Credits: Louis Roth, Bewässerungsarbeiter, 2023; Raisan Hameed, Zer – Störung, Mossul 1993-94 2022; Simon Lehner, Balance Study
EMOP – European Month of Photography
Festival center in the Academy of Arts, Hanseatenweg 10, 10557 Berlin–Tiergarten; map
what stands between us. Photography as a Medium for Chronicling, until 04.05.2025
Bröhan-Museum, Schloßstr.1a, 14059 Berlin–Charlottenburg; map
Will McBride – The Berlin Years. Blackbox #15, 01.03.–01.06.2025
Vernissage 28.02.2025 18h
Haus 1, Waterloo Ufer o.Nr. (Nähe U1/ Hallesches Tor), 10961 Berlin–Kreuzberg; map
Louis Roth – Fata Morgana 07.–09.03.2025
Vernissage 06.03.2025 18h, Artist Talk 08.03.2025 16h
Villa Heike, Freienwalder Str.17, 13055 Berlin–Lichtenberg; map
The scattering loss of space. A two-person exhibition with Anja Nitz and Sinta Werner, 06.03.–29.03.2025
Vernissage 01.03.2025 18–21h
Slovenian Cultural Information Center c/o roam projects e. V., Lindenstr.91, 10969 Berlin–Kreuzberg; map
Jakob Ganslmeier, Ana Zibelnik – Transience and Memory: The Photographic Narratives of the Climate Crisis
Vernissage 28.02.2025 18h
Fotografiska Berlin, Oranienburger Str. 54, 10117 Berlin–Mitte; map
Viviane Sassen – The Body As Sculpture 07.03.–08.06.2025
C/O Berlin, Hardenbergstr.22–24, 10623 Berlin–Charlottenburg; map
Sam Youkilis: Under the Sun until 07.05.2025
@emopberlin
@akademiederkuenste
@broehan_museum
@louisroth_
@_haus1_
@villaheike.berlin
@anazibelnik
@jakob_ganslmeier
@fotografiska.berlin
@coberlin
@samyoukilis
