Alongside its exhibition program, KW Institute for Contemporary Art is continuously pushing beyond the confines of the physical building through its commission program. Throughout the years, these commissions have taken on numerous formats, varying from the infamous slide Valerio II (1998) of Carsten Höller to Renata Lucas’ intervention Kunst-Werke (Cabeça E Cauda De Cavalo, 2010), and Dan Graham’s pavilion (1999) which houses the Café Bravo. These commissions are produced in order to present a different temporality and dedication to art production, in which the environment and architecture of both institutions—KW and the Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art—is challenged.

Renata Lucas
Kunst-Werke (Cabeça E Cauda De Cavalo), 2010

Sidewalk in front of KW’s entrance gate

Photo: Uwe Walter

Renata Lucas tilted the sidewalk exactly 7.5 degrees clockwise in a semi-circle around the entrance gate of KW. The work called Kunst-Werke (Cabeça E Cauda De Cavalo), 2010 was part of a series of interventions Renata Lucas undertook during her exhibition as the recipient of the Schering Stiftung Award.

Albrecht Schäfer
Verkehrsschild #6, 2007

Auguststraße, in front of the entrance gate

Photo: Uwe Walter

Albrecht Schäfers Verkehrsschild #6, 2007 was installed in 2008 as part of Schäfer’s exhibition at KW. The Verkehrsschilder [traffic signs] are part of a group of works in which everyday materials and objects change their inner logic, using only the original materials at hand to produce a new meaning. The sign’s rotation can also be seen as an analogy of the movement and acceleration of traffic.

Philippe Van Snick
Dag/Nacht, 1984–ongoing

Entrance gate of KW

Photo: Frank Sperling

The concept of time, more specifically the dualism of day and night and the lightness and darkness that signifies its passing, is often explored in the artists work, which also aims at underlining the experiential relationship between the viewer and his/her surroundings.

Douglas Gordon

Letter (Number 1), 1991

On the ceiling above the entrance gate

Photo: Frank Sperling

The work Letter (Number 1) welcomes each visitor as he or she enters KW. The text „I am aware of what you are & what you do“ was first exhibited during the 1. Berlin Biennale, which took place in 1998 at the Academy of Arts, and later came to KW. The writing belongs to a cycle of works titled Letters, which Gordon began in 1991.

Andrea Zittel

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, 1998

Studio, front building

Photo: Uwe Walter

In her work, Andrea Zittel reveals a social boundary. The wooden wall system located in one of the typical old-fashioned apartments in Berlin creates a gateway of sorts between the manorial residential area and the former maids chambers. The conventional architectural meaning is no longer relevant, but Andrea Zittel’s work maintains its original function from falling into oblivion and simultaneously exposes a hierarchical passage. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was build for the first Berlin Biennale and has since been on view in the front building of KW.

Susan Philipsz
Rosa, 2002/2021

Single channel sound installation
Duration: 1:40 minutes

Above the entrance of KW’s courtyard

Photo: Lara Scherrieble

Philipsz shapes sounds that are able to unlock memories and emotions in an exceptional way. She develops sound installations whose numerous layers are released through our movements and contemplation. Set site-specifically, her sound works deal with matters such as melancholy, loss, and mourning. 

Lukasz Surowiec

Berlin-Birkenau, 2012

In the courtyard

The birch trees in the courtyard of KW are part of a “living archive” by polish artist Lukasz Surowiec, which consists of hundreds of young trees that come from the area of the former concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. On the occasion of the 7th Berlin Biennale these birch seedlings were distributed as a symbolic gesture throughout the urban area. They become an embodiment of the traumatic past of the place at their respective destination which is usually set in an historical connection to the Holocaust.

atelier le balto 

Archipel, 2017

In the courtyard

Photo: hiepler, brunier

The garden installation Archipel (2017) breaks up the five existing „plant vessels“, which have been realized for the 9th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art in May 2016, and transforms them into an archipelago. Six small islands are intended to accompany the visitors through the courtyard and all the way towards the new entrance of the exhibition spaces at KW, and the Café Bravo. They appear anchored to the already existing walnut trees, crab apples and cherry trees. The plantation expands and evolves from summer throughout autumn and thins out during winter.

Dan Graham

Café Bravo, 1999

In the courtyard

Photo: Manuel Demanega

Café Bravo was designed by Dan Graham and realized with the Architect Johanne Nalbach, and opened in September 1998. The steel structure of the two mutually twisted cubes is layered with mirror polished stainless steel panels. The side surfaces are made of one-way mirror glass, and the ceiling of translucent and opaque glass. The whole body appears at times as transparent, and at others as a mirror.

Judith Hopf
Stepping Stairs, 2018

In the courtyard, left façade

Photo: Frank Sperling

In conjunction with her solo exhibition Stepping Stairs in spring 2018, Berlin-based artist Judith Hopf realized the permanent commission Stepping Stairs for the left side of KW’s façade. A cheekily anthropomorphized face can be recognized in the Hejduk-like sunglasses, paired with a long red tongue and a blonde mop of hair that reaches into the courtyard like a ray of sunshine. Her gesture to animate the inanimate imbues it with the potential for purpose and agency.

Joseph Kosuth

Berliner Chronik, 1994

Across the wall opposite to Café Bravo, in the courtyard

Photo: Jens Ziehe

These sentences were installed by Joseph Kosuth for the first time in 1994, in the context of his exhibition Berliner Chronik (Berlin Chronicles). The phrase belongs to a conceptual work, for which the artist placed quotes by Walter Benjamin in public places throughout Berlin over nine days. The quote originally stems from the article Der Autor als Produzent [The author as producer], which Benjamin wrote during his exile in Paris in 1934. In 1999/2000 it was permanently applied onto the building wall.

Klaus Weber

Large Dark Wind Chime (Prototype), 2008/2021

Façade of KW, in the courtyard

Photo: Frank Sperling

Large Dark Wind Chime, 4.3 m high wind chime in black tempered aluminium, is mounted from the façade of KW Institute for Contemporary Art. The chimes, each as large as church organ pipes, produce a deep bass, typically resonating for several minutes. Its vibrations enter the body, not just the ear. The tones seem to oscillate, like misregistered lines in a screen print.

Sissel Tolaas

KWOPE_2021, 2021

KW Shop

Photo: Margarita Hermann

On the occasion of KW’s 30th anniversary, Tolaas developed an edition of soaps KWOPE_2021 carefully created from recorded and replicated smell molecules she has collected from the building of KW in Auguststraße 69, a former margarine factory. 

Ian Wilson

Discussion (KW), 2017

Staircase of KW

Photo: Sabrina Bernstetter

Ian Wilson is an artist whose work bears a powerful resemblance to the KW’s mission: to explore the relationship between the viewed—or discussed—and the viewer, and the urgency involved in these interactions. Wilson has been exploring spoken language as an art form since 1968. He has described his own work as “oral communication” and later as “discussion”. At Wilson’s own request, his work is neither filmed nor recorded, thereby preserving the transient nature of the spoken word.

Richard Frater

Fall, 2017–fortlaufend