Art-Free Zone at Mahalla Berlin Art Week

"You travelled especially from Amsterdam to Berlin Art Week to not do any Art...??". Yes, that's exactly what I did, though as you hear in the first video of one of our visitors, it was a bit of a paradox, because the Art-Free Zone at Mahalla might actually also be viewed as an artwork... Does that mean there's no escape from Art for me?! A project to Mindfuck others somehow always ends up Mindfucking me the most!

I shared a few videos from visitors because I loved the interaction with my Art-Free catalogues! But most of the time I was just in the Now, so most of the interactions aren't videos, but Memories.

Being surrounded by sketchbooks with empty pages (the Art-Free Catalogues) and not being able to draw in them initially felt like torture. Then at the opening someone mentioned that besides those empty books I should also have a pencil lying around that I couldn't use to make it even more tempting.

"Someone else then thought it would be best to describe the word 'Art' that we should not talk about as the A-word.  Not being able to draw and not talk about Art initially felt like torture, until someone enlightened me and said: "no, it's awareness". And that actually helped me. Stepping out of your comfort zone and stripping reality of things that you consider an essential part of reality definitely is enlighting! It's also the reason why in the past I have spent a week locked up in a box in the desert, or a week in pitch black darkness.

Since a lot of artists entered the space but we couldn't say that we were artists, someone decided to just call ourselves "unemployed", which made everyone happy, and life easier.

OPENING
September 8, 2026 · from 6 PM

UNRUHE
September 8–13, 2026 12PM - 12AM
MaHalla Berlin
Wilhelminenhofstraße 76–77 · Berlin