A Night in Berlin: Inside the “Creative Cacophony” of Hamburger Bahnhof’s Landmark Inaugural Gala

Last year, Observer spoke with Hamburger Bahnhof co-directors Sam Bardaouil and Till Fellrath about the museum’s evolution and their shared curatorial vision. “If there is one principle, it is this: the museum must be restless enough to remain alive to its moment and committed enough to nurture lasting resonance beyond it,” Bardaouil said. That restlessness was very much on display at the institution’s first-ever gala, “A Night in Berlin”—a glittering celebration of not only the museum’s 30th anniversary but also its continual reinvention and the people whose support has allowed it to flourish.

Among them was Cate Blanchett, whose relationship with Hamburger Bahnhof dates to 2016, when German artist Julian Rosefeldt‘s multi-channel video installation Manifesto had its European debut at the museum. Spotted in the crowd were artists Ayoung Kim, Monica Bonvicini, Olaf Nicolai, Petrit Halilaj, Alvaro Urbano, Mark Bradford, Jeremy Shaw, Elmgreen & Dragset, Anne Imhof and Wolfgang Tillmans, along with art world insiders Kira Streletzki, Carla Sozzani, Tricia Tuttle, Max Hetzler, Dahoe Ku, Frances Morris and Glenn D. Lowry. Also present were beloved film and stage talents Edward Berger, Matt Dillon, Nina Hoss, Thomas Ostermeier and Wim Wenders; collectors Christine Würfel-Stauss and Monique Burger; entrepreneur Roshni Nadar Malhotra; and the impeccably dressed Yana Peel, president of Arts, Culture & Heritage at CHANEL.

In the museum’s cavernous 2,500-square-meter Historic Hall, revelers took in performances and spatial installations, from an intervention by Elmgreen & Dragset that transformed thoroughly bemused gala-goers into unwitting performers in a multi-act opera to a site-specific neon installation by Bonvicini and a piano solo by acclaimed pianist Alice Sara Ott. When the crowd quieted, Bardaouil and Fellrath introduced four new awards to be presented by the museum annually: the Hamburger Bahnhof Studio Award, presented this year to Abdulhamid Kircher, Monilola Olayemi Ilupeju and Jonas Roßmeißl; the Hamburger Bahnhof Lifetime Achievement Award, presented to Beirut-born, London-based artist Mona Hatoum; the Hamburger Bahnhof Global Arts Patronage Award, presented to patron and collector Kiran Nadar; and the Hamburger Bahnhof Changemaker Award, presented to London’s Delfina Foundation.

Blanchett, at the dais, called Hamburger Bahnhof and spaces like it irreplaceable. “Tonight is, in part, a celebration of a place where creative cacophony can exist… where different voices, visions and energies meet,” she declared. “For that friction, that deeply human impulse, to be shared among strangers, spaces like Hamburger Bahnhof are essential. They are electric environments that invite us to open up together and, for a moment, surrender to the visions of others.”

Sam Bardaouil, Cate Blanchett and Ignatius Martin Upton

Kira Streletzki

Sam Bardaouil, Ayoung Kim, Katharina Grosse and Till Fellrath

Frances Morris

UFO 360, Anne Imhof and Till Fellrath

Christine Würfel-Stauss and Wolfgang Tillmans

Petrit Halilaj and Alvaro Urbano

Lina Lapelytė, Till Fellrath and Yana Peel.

Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset

Roshni Nadar Malhotra.

Monique Burger

Monica Bonvicini, Carla Sozzani and Sara Maino Sozzani

Matt Dillon and Kira Streletzki

Olaf Nicolai and Max Hetzler

Monica Bonvicini and Andreas Brandstrom

Sam Bardaouil, Frances Morris, Mona Hatoum and Till Fellrath

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