02.2023

STEEL TUBE MEETS LOUNGER

Photo: Michelle Mantel

Created for extensive reading sessions and day-dreaming breaks, the newly launched 22.9 Daybed becomes the most recent addition to Blockbau’s collection. Much like the 22.24 Armchair and 32 Chair from the same line, this too is made of a bent steel tube forming its characteristic shape. The new member of the Blockbau family suggests that the daybed is as important as any other piece of furniture within a living space: “While in Scandinavia the daybed is widely used as a piece of furniture with multiple uses, in Germany it’s still greatly underestimated. The term daybed should be conceptually broadened, because its design works not only as a lounger but also as a seat; not only in private living spaces, but also workplace settings,” says Kevin Rack, the design brand’s founder.

01.2023

I AM NOT AN ARTIST, I AM A PAINTER

Wayne Thiebaud, Girl with Pink Hat, 1973. © Wayne Thiebaud Foundation/ 2022, ProLitteris, Zurich. Photo: Katherine Du Tiel

Wayne Thiebaud, 35 Cent Masterworks, 1970−72 © Wayne Thiebaud Foundation/ 2022, ProLitteris, Zurich

Thiebaud in his studio, 1990. Courtesy of the Wayne Thiebaud Foundation. Photo: Matt Bult

Wayne Thiebaud, Untitled (City View), 1993 © Wayne Thiebaud Foundation/ 2022, ProLitteris, Zurich. Photo: Matthew Kroening

The Fondation Beyeler presents the first posthumous retrospective of Wayne Thiebaud (1920–2021) in the German-speaking world. Virtually unknown in Europe until now, with this exhibition, the museum continues to offer insight into leading proponents of American figurative art, such as Edward Hopper and Georgia O’Keeffe. Most will recognise Thiebaud for his celebrated still lifes, drawn from everyday motifs in post-war America: pastry displays, sweet treats, stuffed toys, or gumball machines. Yet only a few know that within his 70-year career, he consistently worked on figure paintings and large-scale landscapes too. Common to all are his sophisticated use of colour and a distinctive visual idiom straddling the lines between irony, humour, nostalgia and melancholy.

12.2022

A NEWLY RETHOUGHT URBAN DISTRICT FOR CULTURE AND ENCOUNTERS

Holzer Kobler Architekturen, Atelier LOIDL, April 2022 © Philipp Obkircher

For around 8 years, the open industrial wasteland “RAW-Gelände” in Berlin Friedrichshain has been at the center of a participative planning process. The R.A.W.-Gelände is home to a multitude of social and cultural initiatives and shall continue to be a place of gathering and diverse coexistence, of music and sport, of work, leisure and gastronomy, and above all of encounters. The master plan by Holzer Kobler and Atelier Loidl proposes selective building upwards to create urban open spaces for public use while the socio-cultural initiatives remain on site while their continuance will be secured long term. Now it is a question of letting this jointly planned place come into being.

12.2022

YOU SEXY MF!!!!

Château Royal’s hotel bar is the place to go for both locals and visitors alike. Bar manager Matteo Vacca serves classic drinks with subtle twists, like the signature Oyster Martini or Negroni Sous Vide. The drinks are accompanied by a bar food menu from the dóttir kitchen, highlighted by staples such as the crispy oyster mushroom house sandwich served in warm brioche with lovage mayonnaise and crunchy smashed potatoes.

12.2022

RETURNING WITH A NEW CULINARY CONCEPT

dóttir returns to its 2015 location, now newly renovated and integrated into the ground floor of the new Château Royal, as a female-led, vegetable-focused establishment. Here culinary director Victoria Eliasdóttir and chef de cuisine Elena Müller serve creative contemporary cuisine set in deep rounded flavours from mindfully sourced produce. The dishes, as individual as the hotel’s interior, combine classic flavours with forward thinking in à la carte and prix fixe menus, complete with a wine list of over 250 positions.

12.2022

BERLIN’S NOUVEAU ARCHITECTURE

Photo: Esther Grünewald, © Bureau N

Detail Berlin, Floating University, Raumlaborberlin, © Pierre Adenis

Detail Berlin, Verlagsgebäude taz, E2A Architekten, © Rory Gardiner

The publication “Berlin. Urban Architecture and Daily Life Since 2009” by Edition Detail documents the continual urban upheaval that has defined the City of Berlin since the opening of the Neues Museum in 2009. In examining 30 separate projects featuring complementary essays and interviews, the book illustrates how architectural icons, unknown discoveries, urban spaces and locales shape everyday life in the city.

12.2022

SHIFTING PERSPECTIVES ON HISTORY

“Roads not Taken. Oder: Es hätte auch anders kommen können”, scenography by chezweitz, photo: Alexander Butz

The exhibition “Roads Not Taken” at Deutsches Historisches Museum presents an unusual look at the past. Conceived by historian Dan Diner, it explores 14 tipping points in German history that could easily have taken a different turn. To spatially implement the abstract mind game of “Roads not Taken”, scenographers chezweitz created a congenial exhibition design: Using the architectural tools of perspective and trompe l’oeuil, they designed powerful “possibility spaces” that distort or dissolve—depending on the viewpoint: the mind game turns into a visual game.

12.2022

MINI-SUN POWERED

Front view Rudi-Dutschke-Strasse 26. Courtesy of max goelitz. Photo: Dirk Tacke

Installation view energy/power, 2022. Courtesy of max goelitz and Lisson Gallery, London, New York, Shanghai. Copyright of the artist. Photo: Dirk Tacke

Installation view energy/power, 2022. Courtesy of max goelitz and Lisson Gallery, London, New York, Shanghai . Copyright of the artist . Photo: Dirk Tacke

In “energy/power”, the inaugural exhibition of Max Goelitz’ new gallery space in Berlin, artist Haroon Mirza focuses on the harvesting and distribution of electricity to address socio-political issues deriving from technology, nature and humans. Central to the multisensory presentation is the large-scale octagonal sculpture Dyson Sphere (2021/2022), which combines radiating halogen lamps with solar panels. Simultaneously powering an ecosystem of sound-generating objects and psychoactive plants.

11.2022

MODERN-DAY HOLISTIC HEALTH

By combining traditional wisdom with current scientific insights, My Inner Health Club gives guidance on various aspects of health and well-being: from coping with stress, restlessness, and anxiety, to sleeping problems or poor nutrition. The streaming service founded by Ann-Kathrin Grebner and Yasmin Poloczek hosts online classes by leading experts and practitioners from across the globe, reviving ancient knowledge overlooked by the modern health system.

11.2022

HOW TO BEST TEACH DESIGN TODAY?

Key Visual: The ECAL Manual of Style: How to best teach design today? © ECAL, photo: Santiago Martinez

The Iceland Whale Bone Project – Hrefna, 2013 Design: Miloš Ristin; Tutor: Brynjar Sigur Arson © ECAL, photo: Nicolas Genta

Bread Worskhop, 2000 Gruppenprojekt; Tutor: Alexis Georgacopoulos © ECAL, photo: Pierre Fantys

The ECAL/University of Art and Design in Lausanne has put this question to a number of renowned designers and critics. Their answers, displayed in form of projects and objects at the Vitra Design Museum Gallery, reveal the unique approach to teaching pursued at one of Switzerland’s leading design schools, where individual style is not only encouraged, but pushed to develop into its most coherent form. The corresponding publication “The ECAL manual of style” surveys a selection of special projects by students and their tutors.

11.2022

FROM PRALINES TO PLATES

Photos © Pujan Shakupa

Since opening her first studio in Prenzlauer Berg, Kristiane Kegelmann has been fusing confectionery with sculpture in praline editions that boldly challenge the boundaries of flavour and the ephemeral. With the opening of her restaurant pars, a further culinary context is achieved in which the pralines are featured as an individual course, rather than in the traditional position of a Petit Four. The menu features straightforward, season-focussed plates, served at slightly angular tables, designed to recall the asymmetrical forms of the pralines themselves.

10.2022

FONDATION BEYELER’S JUBILEE

Installationsansicht «Jubiläumsausstellung – Special Guest Duane Hanson» in der Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel, 2022 © The Estate of Duane Hanson/2022, ProLitteris, Zurich. Foto: Mark Niedermann

Installationsansicht «Jubiläumsausstellung – Special Guest Duane Hanson» in der Fondation Beyeler, Riehen/Basel, 2022 © The Estate of Duane Hanson/2022, ProLitteris, Zurich. Foto: Lucia Hunziker/LLH Productions

Standing, sitting and strolling among 100 of the Beyeler Collection’s most iconic works are not only visitors but thirteen hyper-realistic sculptures by US artist Duane Hanson. Neither beautiful nor ugly, just ordinary at heart. The figures, embodying marginalised collectives of the 70s-80s American society, populate the rooms and enter a dialogue with both the artworks and the architecture. Yet only a special occasion could have attracted such guests, namely the Fondation Beyeler’s 25 Year Anniversary.

10.2022

HUNGARIAN MODERNISTS

Lajos Tihanyi, Large Interior with Self-Portrait – Man at the Window, 1922, © Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest – Hungarian National Gallery, 2022

László Moholy-Nagy, construction, around 1922, bpk / Kupferstichkabinett, SMB, © Copyright expired, photo: Jörg P. Anders

Little is known, that even before the outbreak of First World War, the rapidly growing city of Berlin attracted a great number of Hungarian artists. In search of a platform to engage with international audiences and encouraged by the failed revolution in their homeland in 1919, the German capital offered them a place to explore creative freedom. With “Magyar Modern” (Hungarian Modernists) Berlinische Galerie renders tribute to the versatile contribution of Hungarian artists to modern art. Among the artists presented are well-known figures such as László Moholy-Nagy or Marcel Breuer and exciting rediscoveries like Lajos Tihanyi.

10.2022

BETWEEN CUBA AND AACHEN

La sentencia “Apártame de todo pecado”, 1994, Courtesy Peter and Irene Ludwig Foundation, Photo: Anne Gold

Belkis Ayón, Nuestro deber, 1993, Ludwig Forum for International Art Aachen, Loan by Peter and lrene Ludwig Foundation, Photo: Simon Vogel, © Belkis Ayón Estate, Havana, Cuba

Belkis Ayón, ¡Ekwe será mío!, 1986, Courtesy Belkis Ayón Estate

Belkis Ayón, Sin título (Sikán, Nasakó y Espíritu Santo), 1993, Ludwig Forum for International Art Aachen, Loan by Peter and Irene Ludwig Foundation, Photo: Simon Vogel © Belkis Ayón Estate, Havana, Cuba

With the survey “Ya Estamos Aquí” Ludwig Forum Aachen ties on the long-existing relationship of the museum with Belkis Ayón, a master of print-making and one of the most influential Cuban artists until this day. In her rich collagraphies she combined catholic iconography with depictions of Abakuá rituals, a secret Afro-Cuban cult which she studied extensively. It was by means of these patriarchial motifs that she reflected on her own social, political and emotional struggles—ultimately shaping new mythologies.

10.2022

SCHINKEL PROGRESSIVE

Right in the historic centre of Berlin, the former site of Karl-Friedrich Schinkel’s famous Bauakademie will be home to the Federal Bauakademie Foundation. After an intense participation process with experts and citizens on the appearance and the use of the future building, one thing is certain: The Bauakademie is to be a demonstration project of what innovative, future-oriented and sustainable architecture means today and tomorrow—radiating the visionary spirit of Schinkel.