EMOP Berlin – European Month of Photography will take place for the 9th time in October 2020. This year again, over 100 galleries, museums, and cultural institutions invite you to discover the multifaceted nature of the medium of photography.

EMOP Opening Days

As is tradition, the festival month kicks off with EMOP Opening Days. Under the motto Photography Between Art, Politics, and Mass Media, a series of panels, talks, and discussions on various topical issues will take place from October 1 to 4, 2020 at Akademie der Künste on Pariser Platz:

• The future of photography education: What is the current state of photography education? How are the main European photography schools positioned?
  Panel with Tina Bara (photographer, Professor HGB Leipzig), Ann-Christin Bertrand (ECAL Lausanne, curator), Marta Gili (Director ENSP, Arles), Timothy Persons (Galerie Persons Project, Berlin), Linn Schröder (Ostkreuz photographer, Professor HAW Hamburg, Ostkreuzschule), Frank Schumacher (Lette Verein, Berlin).
• Photography and institutions: Does Germany need a national institute for photography? What role do museums, galleries, etc. play?
  Keynote: Thomas Weski (Curator, Foundation for Photography and Media Art with the Michael Schmidt Archive, Berlin).
  Panel with Simone Klein (photography reviewer and art advisor, Cologne), Robert Morat (Robert Morat Gallery, Berlin), Kito Nedo (freelance journalist, Berlin), Anne Schwanz (Galerie Office Impart, Berlin), Thomas Seelig (Museum Folkwang, Essen).
• Photography between art and mass medium:
  Discussion on current aesthetic developments in photography from a curatorial and media theory perspective with Jörg Colberg (Conscientious photoblog, USA), Florian Ebner (Centre Pompidou, Paris), Anika Meier (art historian and freelance writer, Berlin), Kathrin Peters (Professor of History and Theory of Visual Culture, UdK, Berlin), Ingo Taubhorn (curator, Deichtorhallen, Hamburg).
• The year 1990. Preserving the new (and old) era:
  Panel with Florian Ebner (Centre Pompidou, Paris), Anna-Beata Bohdziewicz (photographer, Warsaw), Ute Mahler (photographer, co-founder of Ostkreuz Agentur, Berlin), Arwed Messmer (photographer, Potsdam), Iren Stehli (photographer, Prague), Jan Wenzel (publisher, editor of Exposing the Year 1990, Leipzig).
• Artist Talk
  With Stefanie Moshammer (artist and photographer, Vienna) and Johann König (König Galerie, Berlin)

A further highlight are the events surrounding the main exhibition CONTINENT – In Search of Europe. Guided tours by artists, roundtable discussions, as well as artist and book talks offer fascinating insights into photographic confrontations with the European present made by 23 members of OSTKREUZ – Agentur der Fotografen.

Due to the Corona Pandemic and the resulting access restrictions, we kindly ask you to reserve exhibition time slots in advance and to purchase online tickets for events with costs. Both will be available from mid September at: www.adk.de/tickets

Encounters of a special kind

Artist in Action

Under the title Artist in Action, the photographers Katja Ruge, Benita Suchodrev, Miron Zownir, and Olaf Heine provide insights into their work and report live from the past and present.

Dates:
10 October – Benita Suchodrev
17 October – Katja Ruge
24 October – Miron Zownir
31 October – Olaf Heine

Photo Book Talk

The new Photo Book Talk series gives visitors the opportunity to gain deeper insight into the activities of select (photo) book publishers. Bildband Berlin, DISTANZ, and Hatje Cantz invite visitors to a Saturday morning get-together to meet kindred spirits and discover the latest book projects.

Dates:
10 October – Bildband Berlin
17 October – DISTANZ-Verlag
31 October – Hatje Cantz

Film program during EMOP Opening Days

As part of EMOP Opening Days – taking place from 1 to 4 October at Akademie der Künste on Pariser Platz under the motto Photography Between Art, Politics, and Mass Media – a photo film program with rare filmic treats will also be offered.

The photo film genre is based on still images that are perceived as movement in the montage, and which merge into a narrative that can be both fictional and documentary. Often accompanied by a commentary, the photographs thereby gain a new context. One example is Jutta Brückner’s Tue recht und scheue niemand, in which family pictures, accompanied by a monologue by Brückner’s mother, gain in meaning beyond the individual experience through additional works by August Sander and Abisag Tüllmann, among others. Agnès Varda, on the other hand, in Salut les Cubains, uses only her own images, which she took during a trip to Cuba in 1963. Das Warten by Peter Nestler describes the events surrounding a mining accident in Silesia in the 1930s. No less than three films deal with former East Germany: Helke Misselwitz took a subversive approach when commissioned to produce an anniversary film by using 35 photos to create a haunting portrait of a woman whose individuality did not correspond to the official image of women at the time. In Lange Weile, photographer Tina Bara draws on her archives to journey through the 1980s, a time when many people withdrew into parallel lives. In Radfahrer, Marc Thümmler reconstructs the Stasi’s interpretation of photographs by Harald Hauswald. Elfi Mikesch documents the legacy of the Red Army at their military camp in Wünsdorf. What becomes visible is a city in which the military’s hierarchy is as clear as its love of culture.

The following films will be shown consecutively in a loop:

• Chris Marker La Jetée (F 1962), 28 min.
• Agnès Varda Salut les Cubains (F 1963), 30 min.
• Jutta Brückner Tue recht und scheue niemand – Das Leben der Gerda Siepenbrink (1975), 65 min.
• Helke Misselwitz 35 Fotos – Fotos aus einem Familienalbum (1988), 7 min.
• Peter Nestler Das Warten (Väntan) (1985), 6 min.
• Marc Thümmler Radfahrer (2008), 27 min.
• Tina Bara Lange Weile (2017), 60 min.
• Elfi Mikesch Wünsdorf (2020), 32 min.

The films will be shown twice daily from 11:00 am to 7:30 pm in the Black Box at Pariser Platz, and three times between 12:00 am and 12:00 pm on 1 October. Entrance is free and accessible at all times, depending on the number of seats available and according to the applicable hygiene regulations.

Due to the Corona Pandemic and the resulting access restrictions, we kindly ask you to reserve exhibition time slots in advance and to purchase online tickets for events with costs. Both will be available from mid September at: www.adk.de/tickets

EMOP in print

A 300-page, high-quality festival catalogue with information on and images from all 114 exhibitions will be published again this year. It will be available as of mid-September for 10 euros at all participating institutions and cultural projects, and in the online shop. In addition, the free program booklet offers a detailed overview of all opening dates, events, and the exhibition dates.

Information on the exhibitions and events as well as the EMOP Opening Days will be available as of 1 September 2020 at: www.emop-berlin.eu

Oct 1 — 31, 2020
Festival Opening: Oct 1, 12 noon – midnight
EMOP Opening Days: Oct 1 — 4, 2020, at Akademie der Künste, Pariser Platz 4, 10117 Berlin-Mitte.
Program calendar: see EMOP website

EMOP Berlin 2020

100+ locations throughout Berlin & Potsdam