10 November 2017

Autumn General Assembly 2017
Academy members read and comment on texts by Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht

18 November, Akademie der Künste, Hanseatenweg

From 17 to 19 November, the 50th General Assembly of the Akademie der Künste will be held in Berlin. On the agenda are working discussions in the six art sections, reports, debates and talks on future programmes. At the invitation of Academy President Jeanine Meerapfel, the Congolese writer Alain Mabanckou will give a lecture titled Cette Europe qui est en moi at the internal plenary session. The lecture will subsequently be published in the Journal der Künste.

At the public event accompanying the General Assembly on Saturday, 18 November, on the occasion of the recently opened Benjamin and Brecht. Thinking in Extremes exhibition at Hanseatenweg, Alexander Kluge will open his Benjamin Brecht Container, with texts, films, music and surprising ideas. In addition to Alexander Kluge, Academy members Friedrich Dieckmann, Durs Grünbein, Christoph Hein, Kerstin Hensel, Mark Lammert, Emine Sevgi Özdamar and Kathrin Röggla will be reading and commenting on texts by Benjamin and Brecht. Jeanine Meerapfel will give the welcoming address. There will also be scenic tours under the direction of Kerstin Hensel with students from the Ernst Busch Academy of Dramatic Art. The exhibition will be open until midnight.

Also from 18 November, the multimedia installation REPERTOIRE (2016) by Academy member Arnold Dreyblatt will be on permanent display at the Academy building on Hanseatenweg. The work is based on the history of the Akademie der Künste: more specifically, on data related to some 2,500 members since the institution’s founding in 1696.

The Akademie der Künste currently has 415 members. The members’ database is available online at www.adk.de. The archive of the Academy includes over 1,200 artists' bequests. Since 2015, filmmaker Jeanine Meerapfel has been in office as President of the Academy, with writer Kathrin Röggla as Vice-President.

Event
"One cannot learn, not to learn." 
Reading, talk, music, film 
Saturday, 18 November 2017, 8 pm
Akademie der Künste, Hanseatenweg 10, 10557 Berlin, Germany
Admission €12/8
The Benjamin und Brecht. Thinking in Extremes exhibition will be open until midnight.
Press tickets: Reservations at presse@adk.de, Tel. +49 (0)30 20057-1514

Presentation of work 
Arnold Dreyblatt 
REPERTOIRE (2016)
Akademie der Künste, Hanseatenweg 10, 10557 Berlin, foyer 
from 18 November 2017, daily 10 am – 10 pm, free admission