AT A GLANCE
Why go?
Tucked in the garden of the Kronprinzenpalais along Unter den Linden, the Schinkel Pavillon is one of Berlin's most idiosyncratic contemporary art spaces. A glass-walled octagon built in 1969 by Bauhaus-trained architect Richard Paulick, it once hosted GDR state receptions and later sat empty for nearly twenty years. Since 2007, artist and curator Nina Pohl has transformed it into a Kunstverein devoted to experimental sculpture, installation, and media art—showing artists like Isa Genzken, Paul McCarthy, Thomas Hirschhorn, and Louise Bourgeois in a venue where classical terra-cotta reliefs and chandeliers coexist with radical new work.↗↗↗
Good to know
- Art gallery
- Opening hoursVaries by day
- 1 kmfrom Berlin center
- 4.3 / 5296 reviews
- Berlin
A Glass Octagon at the Crossroads of Berlin History
The building itself is as much an artwork as anything shown inside it. Fully glazed on all sides, the octagonal pavilion offers a 360-degree panorama of Berlin's constantly shifting historic center: the Fernsehturm (TV Tower), Berlin Cathedral, Friedrichswerder Church, and the ever-present construction cranes that have defined this part of the city since reunification. The entrance portal, cast in iron around 1835 and flanked by ornamental terra-cotta reliefs, was salvaged from Karl Friedrich Schinkel's demolished Bauakademie (Academy of Architecture)—the very building that gives the pavilion its name. GDR-era chandeliers still hang overhead, creating an unlikely stage for the cutting-edge art below.
