Art in the Underground 2024/25 
flexen, flirren, fantasieren – mapping the queer city
June–September 2025
Opening: June 28th, 2025, 17:00, Bülowstraße subway station
Locations: Nollendorfplatz, Bülowstraße und Schönhauser Allee subway stations (U2)

This year, nGbK once again presents the results of the biannual art competition Art in the Underground, this time under the title flexen, flirren, fantasieren – mapping the queer city. Five art projects bring performances and billboards to stations along the U2 subway line (Nollendorfplatz, Bülowstraße, Schönhauser Allee). An accompanying online magazine combines artistic content with historical and sociopolitical analysis.

In the main, the cities of Western Europe were designed by white, upper-class, cis men. And although town planning in Eastern Europe took a different turn, its structures were still largely patriarchal. But cities and their inhabitants are complex and diverse. People have different needs and strategies for their use of public space. With this in mind, flexen, flirren, fantasieren develops strategies for the use of public space by women, people of color, queer and diasporic people, workers, children, senior citizens and people with disabilities.

The selected works will be shown from June through September 2025 above and below ground at the subway stations Nollendorfplatz, Bülowstraße and Schönhauser Allee along the U2 line. Works on platform billboards will be activated by regular performances. For the opening on June 28, Franziska Pierwoss & Siska will revive the vibrant legacy of the Turkish Bazaar at Bülowstraße subway station with a live concert. In July Lola von der Gracht and Adrian Marie Blount will activate their works at all three stations. And in September, works by Ipek Burçak and Nadin Reschke will be on show at Bülowstraße and Schönhauser Allee.

This year’s edition of Art in the Underground is the first to be accompanied by an online magazine that brings together different perspectives, addressing urban space in a range of ways. The magazine features new and existing texts, videos, and audio works, inviting a succession of artists, writers, and activists to share their viewpoints over the duration of the project. This artistic content will be joined by historical and sociopolitical analyses that underline the intersectional character of the project. The magazine links historical perspectives from East and West Berlin with current issues—especially in the context of the three subway stations along the U2 subway line, which was interrupted during the period when Berlin was a divided city.

Artists: Adrian Marie Blount, Ipek Burçak, Lola von der Gracht, Franziska Pierwoss & Siska, Nadin Reschke

Online magazine with content by: Sara Ahmed, Gürsoy Doğtaş, Mia Göhring, Audre Lorde, Paul B. Preciado, Poligonal, Anh Trieu et al.

Program of events curated by: Marenka Krasomil, Sandra Teitge and Franziska Zahl with Bella Bram and Letícia Oehlgardt

nGbK work group: Yeşim Duman, Lorena Juan, Marenka Krasomil, Sandra Teitge, Franziska Zahl

For interview requests please email presse@ngbk.de

Further program details are available here.

ABOUT ART IN THE UNDERGROUND

Originally called “Kunst statt Werbung” (Art Instead of Advertising), the competition was first held in East Berlin in 1958, with entrants asked to submit posters for peace. The works were shown on platform billboards at Alexanderplatz subway station. Whereas many East German institutions were dissolved or renamed after 1989, this competition survived in its original form. Since the early 1990s, neue Gesellschaft für bildende Kunst (nGbK) has been realizing projects in cooperation with Berlin’s Senate Office for Culture under the title “Art in the Underground” with artworks in or near subway stations.

Supported by Berlin’s Senate Department for Culture and Social Cohesion and funded, on the recommendation of the Art Advisory Committee (BAK), from the citywide budget for public art.