November 21–23, 2025

Contributors: Wisrah C. V. da R. Celestino (featured exhibiting artist), Elisa R. Linn (author, exhibition curator, and educator), Annette Maechtel (art historian and managing director of nGbK Berlin), Yara Mekawei (sound artist and electronic music composer), Axel Wieder (director of the Berlin Biennale and co-founder of Pro qm), Raoul Zöllner (associate art educator at KW Institute for Contemporary Art), and others

Participating venues and initiatives: ACUD, Cashmere Radio, Kunsthaus KuLe e.V., KW Institute for Contemporary Art, nGbK, pro qm, stadtwerkstatt and others

Organized by Agnieszka Roguski & Natalie Keppler

In November, the first three-day Autumn School will take place at Kunst Raum Mitte, marking the conclusion of the DISLOCATIONS annual program. Entitled Stadt als Beute [City as Prey] Revisited, it brings together artists and cultural professionals for discussions, site visits, and walks. The themes address the economies, speculations, and fictions that shape the urban space of Berlin-Mitte with its characteristic East-West history. In line with the concept of dislocation—the shifting and twisting of spatial orders—the Autumn School pursues an expanded idea of space: artists and cultural practitioners from Berlin and beyond are invited to apply to explore together a network of different people, places, institutions, and their stories in relation to the exhibition venue, the former galerie weisser elefant, founded in the GDR. 

Once considered a sign of social decline and impending modernization in the GDR, the area surrounding Kunst Raum Mitte is now synonymous with luxuriously renovated old buildings, rapid gentrification, and commercial galleries. While the municipal gallery was regarded as a place for experimental, oppositional, and young art forms before reunification, the fall of the Berlin Wall raised the question of a new form of resistance: only a few independent spaces were able to survive in the wake of the growing power of the real estate and art markets. The temporary free spaces that emerged here through strategies of self-organization, occupation, and short-term use helped Berlin as a whole gain an image as a utopian space of possibility and a hot spot for international artists. Today, however, it is primarily the growing capital market that benefits from this, while cultural life—now labeled ‘post-cool’ in media discourse—is constrained by drastic budget cuts and restrictive policies.

The Autumn School takes its title from René Pollesch’s play Stadt als Beute [City as Prey], which in 2001 addressed the fictions and promises that were being transformed into neoliberal forms of exploitation. In the Autumn School, participants will explore the social fractures, movements, inclusions, and exclusions that have characterized Berlin-Mitte since the 1990s—and ask how the temporality of art projects is reflected spatially. Does it inevitably lead to a kind of exploitation, or does this “loot”—in German, Beute can mean both ‘prey’ and ‘loot,’ suggesting the city as something hunted as well as something exploited—repeatedly open up spaces for criticism and new perspectives? What contradictions, challenges, and opportunities exist? What stories underlie them? Who has the ability to write them? And what strategies can artists and cultural practitioners develop in response?

Based on the exhibition DISLOCATIONS–on the spot, the program of the Autumn School will focus on the following topics:

1. Situating: concrete localization in and of Berlin-Mitte

2. Shifting: temporary counter-publics and artistic forms of (self-)organization

3. Resonating: intersections with performance, bar culture, and sound

The Autumn School will take place in collaboration with artists, contemporary witnesses, researchers, curators, and actors from neighboring institutions and initiatives. In the evenings, the program will be complemented by public formats such as discussions, screenings, and performances. 

The public program will also be announced in November on this website.

Application:

The open call is aimed at cultural practitioners from all disciplines, researchers, writers, and artists. Participation covers the program costs and offers an organized series of visits and activities, feedback sessions, exchanges with Berlin cultural actors, and a network that facilitates lasting relationships. 

The application should include: 

• A statement of your interest in the Autumn School (max. 300 words)
• Short biography (max. 200 words) and contact details 
• Please send your application (as a single PDF) by October 23 to: autumnschool.berlin@gmail.com

Further information:

• Location: Auguststraße 21, 1st floor (not wheelchair accessible) and surrounding area.
• Participants are responsible for their own travel, accommodation, meals, and personal expenses.
• Letters of recommendation for external funding can be provided.
• Participation in the Autumn School and the public program is free of charge.
• The application deadline is October 23, 2025. 
• Applicants will be notified by October 27.

The project is funded by the State of Berlin’s program for the preservation and development of cultural infrastructure in the districts (Bezirkskulturfonds).