Christian Marclay’s ‘The Clock’ is a 24-hour video work that takes viewers on a journey through a century of film history. Now ‘The Clock’ is coming to Berlin for the first time: from 29 November 2025 to 25 January 2026 at the Neue Nationalgalerie. Since its premiere in London in 2010 and winning the Golden Lion at the 54th Venice Biennale in 2011, the work has attracted worldwide attention and has since been shown in major museums such as MoMA in New York (2012/13 + 2024/25), MCA in Sydney (2013), Centre Pompidou in Paris (2014) and Tate in London (2018/19).
Photo above: Christian Marclay, The Clock2010Single-channel video installationDuration: 24 hours. © Christian Marclay. Photo © White Cube (Ben Westoby).
The Clock is a compilation of thousands of time-related scenes from films and television programmes in which clocks or timepieces appear. After years of meticulous research and editing, Christian Marclay has assembled these scenes and fragments into a seamless 24-hour film experience. The result is an immersive audiovisual journey through film history – and at the same time a functioning clock: the installation is precisely synchronised with local time in Berlin, blurring the line between cinematic and real time.
The work brings together over a hundred years of film history – from iconic thrillers and westerns to obscure science fiction films – and allows time to flow in countless directions simultaneously. ‘The Clock is neither bad nor good, but perfect, perhaps the best film you’ve ever seen,’ writer Zadie Smith explained in 2011 in the ‘New York Review of Books.’ ‘Literally watching the clock for 24 hours may sound like torture. But The Clock is strangely addictive, and visitors often stay much longer than they intended. You can’t take your eyes off the time, and yet somehow it slips away,’ wrote Holly Williams in the New York Times in 2018.
The Clock can be viewed during regular opening hours in a specially constructed cinema within the upper hall of the Mies van der Rohe Building. From 5 to 6 December 2025 and from 1 to 2 January 2026, visitors will also have the opportunity to experience the complete 24-hour work at the Neue Nationalgalerie. Admission outside regular opening hours is free of charge.
Christian Marclay (born 1955) grew up in Switzerland and now lives and works in London. For over 40 years, he has been exploring the fusion of visual art and music. He transforms sound and music into visible, physical forms through performance, collage, sculpture, installation, photography and video.
‘Christian Marclay. The Clock’ is curated by Klaus Biesenbach, Director of the Neue Nationalgalerie, and Lisa Botti, Curator at the Neue Nationalgalerie.
WHEN?
Exhibition dates: Saturday, 29. November 2025 until Sunday, 25. January 2026
Opening hours:
Tue – Wed 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Thu 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Fri – Sun 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
WHERE?
Neue Nationalgalerie
Potsdamer Straße 50
10785 Berlin
