Exhibitions 2021
Yayoi Kusama: A Retrospective A Bouquet of Love I Saw in the Universe
18 March to 7 August 2022
Yayoi Kusama is one of the world’s most important contemporary artists. In April 2021, the Gropius Bau will devote the first comprehensive retrospective in Germany to Kusama’s work. Presented across almost 3000 m², the exhibition will offer an overview of the key periods in her oeuvre, which spans more than 70 years, and feature a number of current works as well as a newly realised Infinity Mirror Room.
Yayoi Kusama, “Infinity Mirror Room – Phalli’s Field”, 1965
© YAYOI KUSAMA, courtesy: Ota Fine Arts, Victoria Miro & David Zwirner
Hella Jongerius: Woven Cosmos
29 April to 15 August 2021
At the heart of Hella Jongerius’s artistic practice is the connection between industry and craft, as well as traditional knowledge and technology. In spring 2021, the Gropius Bau will present a solo exhibition devoted to the artist and designer that will continue to develop over the course of time.
Hella Jongerius, Woven Cosmos, Exhibition view, Woven Windows and Frog Table, 2021
© Gropius Bau / Hella Jongerius, VG-Bildkunst 2021, photo: Laura Fiorio
Everything Is Just for a While
28 May to 17 October 2021
Previously little-known video footage from our own, public and private collections are boldly edited together in ‘Everything Is Just for a While’ to mark the Berliner Festspiele’s 70th birthday and offer a new perspective on artistic positions from around the world that continue to amaze us today.
Takeover. Plastik hört auf Pilz (Plastic Catches Mushroom)
7 June to 29 August 2021
Seeing and understanding the world through children’s eyes – the exhibition Takeover explores this desire. It’s a collaboration between the Gropius Bau and the Stiftung Brandenburger Tor, the Kulturstiftung der Berliner Sparkasse.
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Zheng Bo: Wanwu Council 萬物社
21 June to 23 August 2021
As In House: Artist in Residence 2020, the artist and theoretician Zheng Bo embarked on the question of how plants practice politics. In 2021, his exhibition Wanwu Council 萬物社 will expand upon themes that Zheng Bo worked on during his one-year residency at the Gropius Bau.
Zheng Bo drawing on Lantau Island, 2020
© Zheng Bo, courtesy: the artist and Edouard Malingue Gallery, photo: Kwan Sheung Chi, 2020
Thea Djordjadze: all building as making
18 September 2021 to 16 January 2022
Thea Djordjadze’s artistic practice can be understood as a process of continually reusing, reconfiguring and rearranging objects. From 18 September 2021, the Gropius Bau hosts an extensive exhibition of the Berlin-based artist’s work which will engage in a dialogue with the historic building.
Thea Djordjadze. He ne sa tu to me., 2014 (detail). Wood, steel, plaster, paint
© Thea Djordjadze / VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn; courtesy: Sprüth Magers
The Cool and the Cold: Painting in the USA and the USSR 1960–1990. Ludwig Collection
24 September 2021 to 9 January 2022
30 years after the demise of the Soviet Union, the Gropius Bau presents The Cool and the Cold: Painting from the USA and the USSR 1960–1990, an extensive group show that brings together works held by the Ludwig Collection from six international museums.
Jury Korolyov, Cosmonauts, 1982
photo: Carl Brunn, courtesy: Ludwig Forum für Internationale Kunst Aachen, loan of the Peter and Irene Ludwig Foundation
SERAFINE1369: A Continual Cry
4 November 2021 to 28 February 2022
The video installation A Continual Cry explores liveness in the absence of the performer’s live presence.
SERAFINE1369, A Continual Cry, 2021, Installation view, Gropius Bau
photo: Eike Walkenhorst
Zanele Muholi
26 November 2021 to 13 March 2022
Zanele Muholi self-identifies as a visual activist and has been documenting the life of Black LGBTQIA+ communities since the early 2000s in intimate and powerful photographs across South Africa and beyond. From 26 November 2021 to 13 March 2022, the Gropius Bau will host Muholi’s first major survey in Germany.
Zanele Muholi, Bester V, Mayotte, 2015
© Zanele Muholi, Courtesy of the artist and Stevenson, Cape Town/Johannesburg/Amsterdam and Yancey Richardson, New York