Together with the cities of Brussels, Lisbon, Luxembourg, Paris and Vienna, EMOP Berlin is part of the major international festival European Month of Photography. This year it celebrates its tenth anniversary. Under the leitmotif TOUCH, around 100 exhibitions in Berlin and Potsdam will show the broad diversity of the medium of photography in March. Opening days, talks and guided tours await you in museums, galleries and other cultural venues. We have put together 11 tips for you from the rich programme.
Tip 1: Opening EMOP Berlin and Opening TOUCH
Don't miss the festive opening of the photo festival! The location for the kick-off and for the freshly unconventional anniversary exhibition is cool: In the historic rooms of the former Charlottenburg district court, now a temporary art venue called Amtsalon, the party will go on until midnight. And you can see the anniversary exhibition TOUCH. Politics of Touch. On four floors, 40 artists who have helped shape the city's photo scene will be presented.
When: 2 March 2023, 7 p.m. - midnight
Where: Amtsalon, Kantstraße 79, Charlottenburg
Tip 2: Käthe Kollwitz Prize 2022 - Nan Goldin
Love, sexuality and violence have been the leitmotifs of the world-renowned US photographer Nan Goldin, whose work was honoured with the Käthe Kollwitz Prize 2022, for over 50 years. With her artistic commitment to the LGBTQ community, she broke taboos early on and brought closed worlds of life before the eyes of a broad society. Many of the works on display, which were created in Boston, New York and Berlin, among other places, originate from her individual living environment. Let yourself be fascinated by the immediacy and detachment of her pictures.
When: until 19 March 2023
Where: Akademie der Künste, Hanseatenweg 10, Tiergarten
Tip 3: Jens Juul. Six Degrees of Copenhagen
In 1929, the Hungarian Frigyes Karinthy claimed that all people worldwide are connected up to a sixth degree. The idea of being able to reach people everywhere with chains of friends via no more than six connections is the subject of the Danish Jens Juul: he photographs strangers from anonymous encounters, takes personal, sometimes unsparing photographs of them. Then he has another person in their network named as a friend, whom he also portrays. The result is a chain of human relationships. Check out this exciting photo project about anonymity and networks of relationships!
When: 4 March to 4 May 2023
Where: BBA Gallery, Köpenicker Straße 96, Mitte
Tip 4: Urgent present. The view of the young generation
An exciting topic: How do young aspiring photographers in Berlin feel about the old and new socio-political challenges? Perhaps the pandemic has faded into the background, but the destruction of living environments, the war of aggression on Ukraine and right-wing nationalist social currents are influencing thoughts and feelings. How is this reflected in the pictures of young photo artists? See for yourself what the many photography training centres in Berlin and Potsdam have put together for the EMOP!
When: 4 to 26 March 2023
Where: EMOP Special c/o Leipziger Straße 54, Mitte
Tip 5: Andreas Feininger - New York in the Forties
New York, New York...if you have always been fascinated by this mega-city with its skyline, skycraper, street canyons and its sea of glitter at night, you must see Feininger's ingenious pictures: The son of the famous painter Lyonel Feininger created true icons of photography in the 20th century: his black-and-white classics of urban life in New York City go around the world and still shape our image of this metropolis today.
When: 3 March to 28 May 2023
Where: Bröhan Museum, Schloßstraße 1A, Charlottenburg
Tip 6: Walk of Fame
Artists such as Henri Cartier-Bresson, Annie Leibovitz, Helmut Newton and Russell James not only wrote photographic history, but also had the really big stars in front of their cameras. And that's exactly what the 60 works in the group exhibition Walk of Fame are about: take a look at the masterful portraits of personalities who not only shaped Hollywood over 100 years, but also stand for the aesthetics and glamour of the legendary film city.
When: 11 February to 22 April 2023
Where: Camera Work Gallery, Kantstraße 149, Charlottenburg
Tip 7: Isaac Julien: PLAYTIME
In 2008, the world comes apart at the seams: the great banking crisis leads to the collapse of the existing financial economy worldwide. Six years later, the British photo and film artist Isaac Julien presents his film PLAYTIME, which tells the story of six people affected. Under the question How can capital be visualised?, he illuminates the global economic interconnections that are still highly topical today. The EMOP will also be showing large-format photographs that were taken around the film shootings.
When: 8 March to 10 July 2023
Where: PalaisPopulaire, Unter den Linden 5, Mitte
Tip 8: Progress as a promise. Industrial photography in divided Germany
Cheerful workers on assembly lines, good-humoured blue-collar workers on assembly lines, shiny steel machines and engines: commissioned photography in divided Germany pursued one goal both west and east of the Wall: to create the illusion of a progressive society and the hope of a higher quality of life through increased consumption and beautiful, diverse products. Discover the similarities and differences in the impressive photographs from West and East Germany.
When: until 29 May 2023
Where: German Historical Museum (Pei-Bau), Hinter dem Gießhaus 3, Mitte
Tip 9: William Eggleston - Mystery of the Ordinary
William Eggleston is considered a pioneer of American colour photography. Since the 1960s, he has been one of the first to discover the intensity, brilliance and power of "New Color Photography" and has left his mark on subsequent photographic art. Through the unique colour compositions and colour nuances in his pictures, he gives the everyday and ordinary, be it a tiled house wall or a red dining bench, the touch of the special, the mysterious. The exhibition also shows you unknown works that were created in Europe.
When: until 4 May 2023
Where: C/O Berlin, Hardenbergstraße 22-24, Charlottenburg
Tip 10: Flashes of Memory – Photography during the Holocaust
Various groups documented the catastrophe of the Holocaust photographically: German and Jewish photographers, and then also the Allies during the liberation phase of the concentration camps. The photographs were taken by both private and professional photographers and convey the broad spectrum of different perspectives and intentions. The International Memorial Yad Vashem was the first to critically compile the diversity of the photographs and show them in Jerusalem in 2018. Now you can see the highly acclaimed exhibition in Germany for the first time.
When: 24 March to 20 August 2023
Where: Museum of Photography, Jebensstraße 2, Charlottenburg
Tip 11: Beyond the photographic - Heinz Hajek-Halke's light graphics
In the mid-20th century, the German artist Hajek-Halke invented light graphics, which were created in the darkroom without a camera, and inspired numerous artists with his abstract variations.
But what do abstract images actually mean in the digital age, in today's era of networking, unlimited speed and mobility, the flood of images and signs? Questions that you can discuss together in front of the light graphics, but also in front of the positions of other experimentally working photo artists.
When: 4 March to 29 April 2023
Where: Chaussee 36 Photo Foundation, Chausseestraße 36, Mitte
