In an industry enamoured by novelty and uncertain of its future, even the foolproof formulas must be updated. This year Gallery Weekend Berlin (GWB, 1-3 May), which sees the city’s top galleries open ambitious shows on the same weekend, grows from 50 to 57 participants, thanks to a new section.
Perspectives is a rotating selection of smaller, mostly young galleries that have not yet taken part in the event. These range from closely watched Anton Janizewski, which is showing sculptures by Jiyoon Chung cast from bottles of celebrity-endorsed tequila brands, to Persons Projects, which is presenting a duo show of abstract paintings and photography by Karl Benjamin and Grey Crawford.
Since its launch in 2005 with 21 dealers hoping to attract international collectors to a city teeming with artists but scarce of local buyers, GWB has grown into what is typically regarded by its participants as their best sales week outside of an art fair. Its popularity, and the mushrooming art scene of late 2000s Berlin, saw it grow to 40 galleries, and then to 50, around where it has hovered since.
The model is successful, having been copied dozens of times from London to Warsaw, but is not without fault. For those only consulting the GWB map, they might question whether Berlin’s commercial art scene stopped growing after 2015. Of the galleries regularly taking part, just four—Noah Klink, Sweetwater, Schiefe Zähne and Molitor—were founded in the past decade.
Unlike an art fair, galleries do not apply. Rather, they are invited to join through a selection committee, and the list of exhibitors stays “more or less the same year after year”, says GWB’s director Antonia Ruder. Accusations of elitism and obfuscation have previously been levelled at the selection process, but “space is a key issue”, Ruder says. “We have to ensure that someone could feasibly visit all the galleries over a weekend, and ensure a certain quality of exhibition.”
Perspectives gallery Mountains is showing Shinoh Nam
Courtesy of the artist
Perspectives addresses this issue, while providing a gentler entryway for emerging dealers; those galleries pay 50% of the usual participation fee—which is under €10,000—with the discount funded by the Berlin Senate. Ruder acknowledges the challenges facing galleries: “Prices for everything are going up while sales are not.”
“Perspectives is a long overdue and welcome step in the right direction,” says Markus Summerer, the co-founder of Mountains, which opened in 2019 a few months before the pandemic. For Perspectives, it is showing sculptures and wall-based works by the South Korean artist Shinoh Nam. Described in an accompanying text as “architectural fragments”, they range from slices of wooden doors to sculptures in hand-worked steel, burnt wood and glass (priced €2,000-€16,000).
Summerer now hopes that the Perspectives initiative can go even further. “Perhaps the idea of ‘rotation’ could be applied more to the main sector, rather than primarily to the younger galleries,” he suggests.
Indeed, while most of the Perspectives galleries are young, some have professionalised quickly, through taking part in art fairs and developing an international and multi-generational roster. (Mountain’s programme also includes the late Filipino artist and activist David Medalla). “Twenty years ago, Berlin offered a much lower barrier to entry, financially and structurally,” Summerer says. “Today, it seems the challenges are more complex. Young galleries need to be both financially resilient and strategically agile. At the same time, expectations—from artists, collectors and institutions—have become more global from the outset.”
The decision for GWB to introduce a crop of new, ambitious dealers reflects not just a shifting local gallery scene but a city, too. The promises of bohemian Berlin—super-cheap rents and uncensored expression—have, in recent years, vanished or been proven false, turning the stream of artists flocking to the city into a slow trickle. Add recent arts funding cuts and two culture minister resignations in as many years, and the city is facing something of an identity crisis.
Mark Barker’s Untitled (2025), at Shahin Zarinbal
Photo: Eric Tschernow; dourtesy the artist, Shahin Zarinbal, Berlin
“It feels like everything is being reshuffled,” says Shahin Zarinbal, whose eponymous gallery will present photography, charcoal drawings, watercolours and a large painting by Mark Barker, “each referencing bodily functions and forms of enclosure” (€2,500-€18,000).
The arrival of Perspectives in this febrile context is a smart move. The news is even embraced by former detractors of GWB such as the gallerist Christian Siekmeier, who described the event as a “protectorate” in a 2018 interview to Artnet News. He welcomes the section as “a great decision to open up the event”.
Shifting sands
If certain realities of Berlin have been dispelled in recent years, it seems that new ones are forming in their place. In January, the inaugural, celebrity-studded Hamburger Bahnhof fundraising gala marked a watershed moment for the private philanthropy landscape of a city where, not so long ago, being openly rich was considered unfashionable.
Attempts to galvanise the influx of wealth flowing to the city are under way. Ruder notes that “Chinese and Canadian collectors are buying up second homes in Berlin. And there is a lot of new tech wealth in this city. We know there are people out there interested in supporting the arts.” Still, their influence is not yet being felt across all levels. “We can’t see a bigger local collecting base,” Summerer says. “Our collectors are from everywhere.”
Meanwhile, others warn against romanticising the Berlin of years past. Siekmeier moved his gallery Exile from Berlin to Vienna in 2018, noting that in Berlin at the time “there was extremely little institutional engagement, just a few ego-driven collectors. You had to have affluence beyond ends to make it work”.
As for those existential Berlin questions, Zarinbal encourages perspective: “It’s a struggle, but galleries are feeling it at all levels.” And as many a Berliner will tell you, the city has long been in flux. “We benefit in many ways from not having as clear an identity as Paris or London,” Zarinbal says. “Everything is open to debate; it’s a productive friction.”
