I have been absent for a while, but today is a day to celebrate. My favourite building in Berlin reopened: the Neue Nationalgalerie by Mies van der Rohe. The most perfectly balanced building I know. After years of hiding behind scaffolding the house is back: unchanged, for the most part. David Chipperfield architects did a great job not disturbing this masterpiece, while restoring it. This project cost Germany 140 million Euros – and I think it’s worth every cent of taxpayer’s money (mine, too – this is exactly why I don’t mind paying tax).
The actual reopening took place end of August this year, but I saw it now for the first time. And it made me happy. As it wasn’t possible to see the inside fully, except for a short peak inside the guard allowed me to have (there are still limitations in place due to Covid19), we circled the outside a few times. The big stone plateau around the house is used by young folks practising their skate boarding skills. And countless other folks, just like sweetheart and I, welcoming this sight back to ever changing Berlin.
And to not let you go this morning without any art at all, let me spoiler, what I also saw that day: an exhibition about Ferdinand Hodler, a swiss modernist, in relation to the Berlin modernism at Berlinische Galerie. Here is a sneak preview:
floatsome 