Berlin Unlimited

Berlin holds a reputation of a city where everything is possible, where its own scars and voids become a playground for creativity and experimentation for everything from the arts to politics and from architecture to philosophy; a carte blanche of unlimited possibilities. What are the potentialities of this new Berlin and what are the roles and the rules in its new urban play? What future visions are replacing the ideologies of the past? Have its inhabitants found the freedom they were looking for or is an idealised representation disguising much more complex and sometimes conflicting urban realities?

Berlin Unlimited was the first trans-disciplinary festival gathering arts, architecture and urban research to paint a picture of contemporary Berlin 25 years after the fall of the wall. The seven day festival settled in the Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U) in October 2014. A diverse programme of workshops, exhibitions, lectures, conferences, film screenings, creative cooking, performances, guided tours and urban parties brought together artists, architects, researchers, and Berlin enthusiasts to rediscover the city and co-create its story – an interdisciplinary collection of work in the arts and creative media, architecture and urban design, theory and research, that reveal, reflect on, challenge, and reform, the limits and the limitations of the city.

Central in the festival programme, the Berlin Unlimited workshop consisted of urban explorations, on-site visits, and group work. The workshop was conducted by a team of international guest and local host tutors: each guest tutor brings a unique way of looking at the city, while the unit’s host tutors brings a thematic framework and understanding specific to the local content of Berlin. The workshop’s main objective is to equip participants with a sharpened vision through which to comprehend the city as a complex interactive system. It aims towards the development of collaborative strategies that challenge conventional methods of urban analysis and cut through disciplinary boundaries, encouraging creativity and originality.
 

Festival programme

Workshop programme

Images from top:

1. Berlin Unlimited at Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
2. Exhibition opening, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
3. Exhibition opening, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
4. Exhibition opening, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
5. Conference, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
6. Conference, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
7. Urban exploration, Berlin, October 2014
8. Workshop group work, Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014
9. “Berlin imaginarium: Urban transformation through storytelling”, presentation poster by one of the workshop teams – download booklet produced by the team
10. Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik (ZK/U), Berlin, October 2014