The Projekt Birkenstrasse is an art project sponsored by ZK/U Berlin, which aims at an alternative use of the space underground station Birkenstrasse. The subway station, which is currently being renovated and redesigned, becomes a stage, an exhibition space for art, or even a subject for artistic works. By using the underground station for artistic actions, this part of the public space is made accessible in a new way. In particular the project thematizes the special feature of an underground station as an anonymous meeting place, a transit station and a place to linger in public space.
The project is led and curated by Matthias Gerber and Linus Lütcke, who are residents of the project space „Ständige Vertretung" of the Z/KU Berlin from September to October 2018.
At the start of the project, local artists from the neighborhood were invited to participate in the project. The Call for Artists was aimed at artists whose works break up and question common behavioural routines in public space and thus open up new dimensions of the use (and/or design) of public space. Of particular interest were works that promote interaction with their viewers (the users of the U-Birkenstrasse) and provoke new ways of seeing and acting in public space in general and the U-Birkenstrasse in particular.
The opening of the exhibition for Projekt Birkenstrasse was on the 26th of October. Some artworks were displayed in the station itself, whilst other were exhibited in the basement of ZK/U Berlin. For further information please check: http://www.projekt-birkenstrasse.de/