Fifty years ago, on 12 December 1976, Ulay ‘stole’ Carl Spitzweg’s The Poor Poet (1839) from the Neue Nationalgalerie and took the painting to the home of a Turkish working-class family in Berlin-Kreuzberg. Half a century later, the Neue Nationalgalerie is revisiting this groundbreaking action with the exhibition ‘Ulay, Ulay & Abramović’, returning Ulay’s work to the very place where one of his most significant actions took place. The exhibition will open on 28 November 2026.
Image above: Ulay / Marina Abramović, Rest Energy, Performance for Video, 1980, 4 minutes, ROSC‘ 80, Dublin.
Ulay is regarded as one of Germany’s most significant conceptual artists, yet remains largely unknown to a wider audience in Germany to this day. The exhibition aims to change that. It offers an insight into Ulay’s early artistic work, including ‘S’he’ (1973–1974), a series of intimate self-portraits that explore identity and transformation, and ‘FOTOTOT’ (1976), in which unexposed or unfixed photographs gradually fade away when exposed to light. The work forms part of a broader series of experiments in which Ulay questions the supposed objectivity, permanence and evidential nature of the photographic image, whilst pushing the boundaries of photography into the realm of performance and other forms of artistic action. Furthermore, the exhibition showcases the unique collaboration between Ulay and Marina Abramović over a period of twelve years, from 1976 to 1988.
About Ulay
Ulay (Frank Uwe Laysiepen, 1943–2020) grew up in Solingen and initially trained as a mechanical engineer before studying photography at the Kölner Werkschulen. In 1968, he moved to Amsterdam, where he began working with Polaroid. In his artistic practice, he explored themes of identity, gender and transformation. His performative photography soon gained recognition within Amsterdam’s innovative and international art scene; early exhibitions took place at the Seriaal Gallery and the legendary and influential institution De Appel. From 1976 to 1988, his collaboration with Marina Abramović attracted international attention. This included joint performances at documenta 6, 7 and 8, as well as exhibitions across Europe and the USA. Following his separation from Abramović in 1988, Ulay continued his independent artistic practice. His works were later shown in major solo exhibitions and retrospectives, including at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt in 2016 and at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam in 2020–21 with ‘ULAY WAS HERE’, the largest retrospective of his work to date. From 1998 to 2004, he was Professor of Media Art at the State Academy of Design in Karlsruhe. In the decades that followed, he realised participatory art projects worldwide with socially marginalised groups, including in the USA, Australia, India, Myanmar and Syria. Ulay died in Ljubljana in 2020.
About Marina Abramović
Marina Abramović (born 1946, Belgrade) has been regarded since the early 1970s as a pioneer of performance art as an independent art form. She created some of the most significant early performances, including ‘Rhythm 0’ (1974) and ‘Rhythm 5’ (1974). In these works, she explored the limits of the body and mind and, through duration, stillness and pain, examined endurance, vulnerability and the audience’s shared responsibility. In 2012, she founded the Marina Abramović Institute (MAI), a charitable foundation for performance art and long-duration performances, based on the ‘Abramović Method’ she developed. Abramović was among the first performance artists to be institutionally established in the museum world and has been represented in major solo exhibitions across Europe and the USA for over 25 years. Highlights include her first major retrospective in the USA, as well as the performance ‘The Artist Is Present’ at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York (2010), which lasted over 700 hours, the retrospective ‘The Cleaner’ (2017–19) and, in 2023, the first solo exhibition by a woman in the Main Galleries of the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Her awards include the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale (1997), the Princess of Asturias Award for the Arts (2021), the Sonning Prize (2023) and the Praemium Imperiale for Sculpture (2025).
The exhibition centres on Ulay’s 1976 performance and its film documentation, Irritation – There is a Criminal Touch to Art. The work challenged the museum as a site of cultural authority and drew attention to the social realities beyond the museum. By bringing Spitzweg’s iconic work “The Poor Poet” into the home of a Turkish working-class family, Ulay challenged notions of cultural representation, belonging and exclusion in 1970s West Berlin. Five decades later, the Neue Nationalgalerie is placing the work in dialogue with a version of ‘The Poor Poet’ on loan from the Grohmann Museum in Milwaukee. Together, the works open up new perspectives on artistic interventions, institutional frameworks and the diverse lived experiences of people’s circumstances and environments.
Alongside further works from Ulay’s independent artistic practice, the second part of the exhibition focuses on the collaboration between Ulay and Marina Abramović. They met in Amsterdam in 1975 and soon developed a close personal and artistic partnership. Between 1976 and 1988, the two artists staged pioneering performances in which they used their bodies as a medium to explore questions of identity and institutional boundaries. Their collaboration began with ‘Relation in Space’ (1976), which was performed as part of the 38th Venice Biennale and in which they explored physical encounter, repetition and mutual presence. It culminated in ‘The Lovers’ (1988), their 90-day journey along the Great Wall of China.
The exhibition brings together videos, photographs, sculptures and drawings, as well as sketches and letters, and ‘Imponderabilia’ (1977), a groundbreaking live performance by Ulay and Marina Abramović. In it, the two artists stand naked, facing each other in a narrow doorway, and invite visitors to walk between their bodies. The performance is staged daily from 3.00 pm to 4.30 pm as part of the exhibition. Taken together, the works offer insight not only into the performances themselves, but also into the underlying processes, discussions and reflections. They demonstrate how Ulay and Marina Abramović integrated their artistic practice into everyday life, thereby redefining collaboration and self-representation. At the same time, they challenged established notions of authorship and individuality, as well as the boundaries between art and life. Their works explored vulnerability, endurance, trust and interdependence, and are regarded as milestones in performance art.
The exhibition takes place on the lower floor of the Mies van der Rohe building. It begins with two rooms dedicated to Ulay’s independent artistic practice, before moving on to the works developed jointly by Ulay and Marina Abramović. The juxtaposition of their collaborative works with Ulay’s independent artistic practice highlights the significance of his work for the history of conceptual and performance art, whilst also offering a new perspective on his role in Germany and internationally.
The exhibition is organised by the Neue Nationalgalerie to mark the 50th anniversary of Ulay’s performance ‘Irritation – There is a Criminal Touch to Art’. It presents a selection of Ulay’s individual works within the context of this important phase of his artistic practice. It also presents selected materials and artworks from ‘ART VITAL – 12 Years of Ulay / Marina Abramović’, originally conceived by Alenka Gregorič and Felicitas Thun-Hohenstein and first shown at the Cukrarna Gallery / MGML (30 November 2025–10 May 2026), in collaboration with Lena Pislak – ULAY Foundation and Sydney Fishman – Marina Abramović Archives.
“Ulay, Ulay & Abramović” is curated by Klaus Biesenbach, Director of the Neue Nationalgalerie, in collaboration with Ricarda Bergmann of the Neue Nationalgalerie and Alenka Gregorič, Artistic Director of the Cukrarna Gallery. Curatorial assistant: Nikola Richolt.
WHEN?
Exhibition dates: Saturday, 28. November 2026 – Sunday, 02. May 2027
Press preview: Friday, 27. November 2026, 11 am.
Opening hours: Tue – Wed 10 am – 6 pm., Thu 10 am – 8 pm., Fri – Sun 10 am – 6 pm.
WHERE?
Neue Nationalgalerie
Potsdamer Straße 50
10785 Berlin
