Open Air Cinema

This event is taking place at Berlin Art Week Garten at Neue Nationalgalerie 

Over four evenings, Berlin Art Week Garten 2026 at Neue Nationalgalerie once again becomes an open-air cinema for contemporary artists’ films. This year’s programme brings together recent works by artists at the beginning of their professional careers from four different Berlin programmes and initiatives: Nina Fischer’s Experimental Film and Media Art class at Berlin University of the Arts (UdK); the Lensbased Community, which grew out of the UdK’s Multimedia Art Class under Hito Steyerl and has been led by Mykola Ridnyi since 2023; BPA// Berlin program for artists, a mentoring programme founded by Angela Bulloch, Simon Denny, and Willem de Rooij in 2016; and the residency programme run by Between Bridges, a foundation established by Wolfgang Tillmans in 2017. The selection includes some of the artists’ latest works and offers a glimpse into a young, internationally oriented Berlin art scene.

Videoart at Midnight has invited the four partners to present a selection of their artists and current works, making their different artistic approaches accessible to audiences in a distinctive public setting. Rather than screening the films as individual works in an exhibition space, the programme presents them as a shared cinematic experience—from beginning to end, in the dark and under the open sky. The Garten becomes a temporary meeting place for artists, their works, the institutions, and an audience invited to discover new forms of the moving image.   

What connects them is an understanding of film and video as an open artistic practice that moves beyond fixed boundaries of genre and medium. The moving image takes shape in dialogue with visual art, installation, performance, research, and social questions. At the same time, these institutions and programmes play an important role in supporting artists in Berlin: they create spaces for production, research, mentoring, exchange, and public presentation, helping new work and practices to develop.   

THU 10 SEP 8.30—9.30pm 
Klasse Experimenteller Film / Medienkunst (UdK) curated by Nina Fischer
Lorenzo Sabbatini & Inti Gallardo, ›Autotrophic Archaeology‹ 9.15 min;
ZouZou, ›Will We Still Meet?‹ 5.30 min;
Maggie Rouleau, ›Apple Pie‹ 1.00 min;
Ilgın Uçar, ›Firfir‹ 10.00 min;
Simón Jaramillo Vallejo, ›Huellas de Carbón 001‹ 8.44 min;
Ran Ren, ›Land of Ulro‹ 10.00 min;
Yumeng He, ›Jiejie‹ 12.27 min;
Edlin Jap, ›The Wedding Photo‹ 3.26 min;
Ying Chen, ›Ciao Ciao Guo‹ 6.21 min  

FRI 11 SEP 8.30—9.30pm 
BPA// Berlin Program for artists kuratiert von / curated by Anna-Lisa Scherfose
Andrés Mora Balzaretti, ›Paradisi‹ 2023, 17.32 min;
Tang Han & Xiaopeng Zhou, ›Ordinary Affects‹ 2025,16.00 min;
Hana Yoo, ›I Came for the Flowers‹ 2025,9.15 min;
Alejandra Morote Peralta, ›The Drug Stores‹ 2025, 2.22 min;
Tra My Nguyen, ›She Who Moves‹ 2025, 14.00 min;
Jan Berger, ›S1E6: Die and Rejoin the Stars‹ 2026, 3.50 min;  

SAT 12 SEP 8.30—9.30pm 
The Lensbase Community (UdK) kuratiert von / curated by Mykola Ridnyi
Kaiwen Kang ›Double Surroundings‹ 2024, 10.00 min;
Lena Kocutar ›The sun that fell into the water‹ 2025, 20.55 min;
Esteban Rosales Samayoa ›Venus Cycles‹ 2025;
Daria Syvakos ›What we lost in the water‹ 2025  

SUN 13 SEP 8.30—9.30pm 
Between Bridges kuratiert von / curated by Melissa Canbaz 
Lucy Beech ›Out of Body‹ 2024, 22.00 min; 
Yalda Afsah ›Curro‹ 2023, 28.00 min; 
Didem Pekün ›Leyla‹ 2024, 2.45 min