The 7th Berliner Herbstsalon begins on 2. October 2025 under the title of ЯE:IMAGINE: THE RED HOUSE. Featuring works by over 100 artists and world premieres from Ersan Mondtag, Lola Arias, Hakan Savaş Mican, Adiana Shibli and Oliver Frljić.
Image above: 7. Berliner Herbstsalon – ЯE:IMAGINE: THE RED HOUSE: Danica Dakić, IMA LI SNIJEGA?, 2024, VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn.
The 7th Berliner Herbstsalon begins on 2. October 2025 under the title of ЯE:IMAGINE: THE RED HOUSE – INVENTORIES/INTERVENTIONS/INVENTIONS. It will be the Maxim Gorki Theatre’s final salon from Shermin Langhoff, who launched the biennial format in 2013 and is also curating this year’s edition.
For the opening of the 2025/26 season, Langhoff’s last as artistic director of the Gorki, both long-time collaborators and new artists have been invited to the Berliner Herbstsalon. They will use old and new works to – in light of the present – reflect on, reclassify and (re)imagine for the future the critical art practices, the struggles and resistances, negotiated over this period. The salon begins with both the opening of the exhibition located throughout the Gorki, in the Palais am Festungsgraben, the Gorki Kiosk and outdoor spaces, as well as the world premiere on the Gorki mainstage of Ersan Mondtag’s production of DAS ROTE HAUS, dedicated to Berlin’s Stresemannstraße 30 and the stories and histories of its inhabitants. This was once the Telefunken company dormitory for women who came from Turkey in the 1960s and 70s to start their new lives in Berlin. A documentary exhibition and a series of related events complement the production.
Selected artworks from the past six editions of the Herbstsalon will be placed in new contexts in the seventh edition and reinforced with new works. The invited artists include Nevin Aladağ, Cana Bilir-Meier, Danica Dakić, Zehra Doğan, Daniel Knorr, Hiwa K, Delaine le Bas, Emine Sevgi Özdamar, Ülkü Süngün, Nasan Tur, Serpil Yeter and Zelimir Zilnik. The salon will also feature world-premiere productions from Lola Arias, Ersan Mondtag, Hakan Savaş Mican, Adania Shibli and Oliver Frljić, as well as many other performances by Nazanin Noori, among other artists, who invite us to take history personally and reflect on our here and now. The programme also includes some works by artists, including Astghik Melkonyan and Atom Egoyan, who were featured in the Gorki’s Re:Imagine 100 + 10 programme this spring, which served as the prologue to the 7th Berliner Herbstsalon. In total, more than 100 works by around 60 artists will be on display in the exhibition alone.
Furthermore, select productions from the Gorki’s repertoire will be shown throughout the salon, incorporating long-term artistic collaborators such as Nurkan Erpulat, Marta Górnicka and Yael Ronen into the programme, as well as productions from the up-and-coming artists of recent years including Lena Brasch, Murat Dikenci and Roza Sarkisian.
Shermin Langhoff, Maxim Gorki Theatre Artistic Director: »Today, the past is being offered to us as the future. Once again, there are walls being built everywhere. Fewer and fewer people dictate the lives of more and more. Even democracies are calling for strong men again. This is what the Gorki Theatre works against. Over the past twelve years, we have never stopped seeking out the near and distant past in order to explore new paths into the truly new and unknown: into the future. That’s what Re:imagine is all about. The theatre, the arts in general, are not only places where we can think and dream but also places where we can test out stances that mobilise us, because we know ›how quite soft water will, through its motion over the years, grind strong rocks away.‹«
Participating artists
An exhibition with works by Nevin Aladağ, Züli Aladağ, bankleer, Mehtap Baydu, Cana Bilir-Meier, Zühal Bilir-Meier, Luchezar Boyadjiev, Timur Çelik, Danica Dakić, Silvina Der Meguerditchian, Nihan Devecioğlu, Zehra Doğan, Can Dündar, Ahu Dural, Atom Egoyan, Semra Ertan, Harun Farocki, Marta Górnicka, Manaf Halbouni, IMAGINARY COLLECTIVE (initiated by Danica Dakić, Ina Weise, Lea Wittich, Arijit Bhattacharyya), Hiwa K, Gülsün Karamustafa, Miro Kaygalak, Piruza Khalapyan, Daniel Knorr, Davit Kochunts, Omer Krieger, Damian Le Bas, Damian James Le Bas, Delaine Le Bas, Jazgul Madazimova, Maria Paula Maldonado, Khoren Matevosyan, Astghik Melkonyan, Hakan Savaş Mican, Karen Mirzoyan, Ersan Mondtag, Lousineh Navasartian, Emine Sevgi Özdamar, Sasapin Siriwanij, Ülkü Süngün, Filiz Taşkın, Hale Tenger, Nasan Tur, Melek Konukman-Tulgan, Serpil Yeter, Zentrum für Politische Schönheit, Želimir Žilnik as well as theatre and performances by Ersan Mondtag, Lola Arias, Hakan Savaş Mican, Adania Shibli, Oliver Frljić and many more.
WHEN?
Opening: Thursday, 2. October 2025, 5 pm, in front of the Maxim Gorki Theatre
Duration: Thursday, 2. October until Sunday, 30. November 2025
Opening hours:
Mo–Sa: noon–6:30 pm
Su/holidays: 4–6:30 pm
WHERE?
Maxim Gorki Theater
Am Festungsgraben 2
10117 Berlin
