The World Is Not Fair - The Great World Fair 2012

From June 1 through June 24, an ambitious project will be on site at the Flugfeld Tempelhof: the Great World’s Fair 2012, an exhibition featuring 15 pavilions, planned and realized by Hebbel am Ufer and the architectural collective raumlaborberlin. Entitled “The World Is Not Fair,” the event is an ironic reference to the tradition of the “expos,” which have been organized for more than 160 years in different locations worldwide. The pavilions on the Tempelhofer Feld do not see themselves as serving the branding of nation-states, but as sites for thinking about the world subjectively and artistically.

Across disciplinary boundaries, theater makers, performers, visual artists, filmmakers, and architects explore ideas or phenomena that connect even the most remote and out-of-the-way cultures. With his architectural structure that is reminiscent of the damaged nuclear reactor in Fukushima, the Japanese director Toshiki Okada (Yokohama) reminds us of the abstractness and immensity of catastrophic events. Filmmaker Harun Farocki (Berlin) examines the role of computer animation for forecast services, which evoke the global cycles of air, fire, water, and the desire to control a world in which future events are increasingly difficult to predict. Other participants include artist Tracey Rose (Johannesburg), the architectural collective Umschichten (Stuttgart), and director Hans-Werner Kroesinger (Berlin).

With its enormous expanse and its diverse history as a former parade ground, a site of early aviation experiments, a military base for the Nazi air warfare, and final destination of the airlift between Berlin and West Germany, the former Tempelhof Airport is the ideal location for the Great World’s Fair 2012. By choosing this historical site, “The World Is Not Fair – The Great World’s Fair” also invites us to think about how to deal with public spaces and the future of the city.

The concept of a world’s fair as a forum for utopian and real ideas of life in this world is both a grand and bold idea. The Ernst Schering Foundation supports this project at the interface of the visual and performing arts, because it broadens our horizons and makes us think in terms beyond the nation-state.

Exhibition

The World Is Not Fair – The Great World’s Fair 2012

Tempelhofer Park

Main entrances on Oderstrasse, Tempelhofer Damm, and Columbiadamm

We recommend that visitors come by bike.

Opening Hours of the Pavilions

June 1-3, June 7-10, 2012

June 14-17, June 21-24, 2012

Thu and Fri: 4 – 9 p.m.

Sat and Sun: 2 – 9 p.m.

Photo: © raumlaborberlin

For more information, please contact the Ernst Schering Foundation at +49-(0)30-20 62 29 60 or visit: www.hebbel-am-ufer.de