I was fascinated with the art scene in Berlin for many years, and my decision to move out here as a fledgling journalist was fuelled by a desire to get closer to it, away from the staid, expensive and ultimately exclusive London scene. I love the bohemian element of art belonging to the people and that you can't walk down the street without tripping over an installation, or being invited into a dilapidated building for some warm white wine and crazy drawings.
The highlight of a recent vernissage trail through Mitte was Torstrasse 166, which was a sadly short-lived installation project in a disused apartment building. A group of artists were given run of the place in typical, uninhibited Berlin style and the artistic free-for-all included in an impressive collection of shoes stuck to the outside of the building and strung up with red string, video installations and a terrifying blacked-out den. Visitors ran with childlike glee from room to room, curiosity tinged with the feeling that you were not quite sure you were allowed to be there. The top floor provided the obligatory place sit, drink and bop your head to the DJ.
The creations of young artistic radicals are being mounted, installed and performed on a daily basis in this city, but Berlin still respects the masters when they come to town.
The Richard Avedon retrospective opened last month at the Martin Gropius Bau and the queue to see images by the legend of 20th century portrait photography stretched down the block. My tip would be to visit this must-see exhibition on a weekday afternoon, when you won't be agitated by poking elbows and heavy breath on your shoulder.
The exhibition chronicles every aspect of Avedon's black and white portraiture room by room, beginning with his fashion shoots in the 1950s for Vogue and Harper's Bazaar – including the iconic image of the model Dovima poised elegantly in a Dior dress between two elephants – to more formal commissions from the White House, an animated, naked Nureyev and a cunning Tennessee Williams.
Avedon's work is a curator's dream; his photographs are so neatly categorized both chronologically and by theme, but his images are so defiantly individual that they each transcend any given context. My favorite room was his ode to the common American man; orchestrated shots of citizens of the American Mid- West under Reagan. Their grouping is irrelevant and gives absolutely no sense of bland normalcy. Each image is so strong and exists in and of itself, that each Average Joe is perfectly immortalized and as unforgettable as the sad eyes of Marilyn Monroe in the next room.
The staunch, brick Martin Gropius Bau gallery sits neatly on the line of the former wall, only feet away from a remaining chunk of it and is neighbor to the topography of terrors. The exhibition ends neatly with an acknowledgement of its current residence – potent images of the night of Dec. 31, 1989, when Avedon took stark shots of the anxious Berliners congregated in Pariser Platz.
The discerning aestheticism of Agnes B is commonly attributed to her highly successful fashion brand, which has been the embodiment of Parisian chic since the 1970s. CO Berlin is currently housing her private art collection, a feast of brilliant photography spanning over a century and from every continent. The list of artists on show would read as a who's who of the most recognizable – Cartier-Bresson, Man Ray, influential – Weegee, Diane Arbus and controversial – Gilbert and George, Douglas Gordon- artistic figures, but there is no sense that she has arbitrarily picked works from the big names, as is often the case with many more self-conscious and less knowledgeable investors. Her choices reflect her impeccable taste, empathy and sense of humor.
Along with the accompanying biography and written interviews with the lady herself, her collection provides an insight into her character. She herself graduated from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Versailles and was intent on becoming an artist, before following a career fashion design out of financial necessity. Her hand-picked collection includes Nan Goldin's ethereal images of often seemingly tortured victims of a harsh New York urban lifestyle and Martin Parr's more sardonic take on holiday-makers paddling in some stony area of the Southern English coastline. I love his large photographs rich with cheerful azure skies and portraying podgy children and unhappy mothers. This personal assortment of beautiful images should be top of the list of exhibitions to visit in Berlin this month.
Richard Avedon – Photographs 1946–2004: A Retrospective
Martin-Gropius-Bau
Until Jan. 19
Photographs of the Collection Agnès B
C/O Berlin – International Forum for Visual Dialogues
until Dec. 7
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Expatica’s new arts critic hits the arts trail in Berlin and discovers plenty to wonder at.
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