Gallery Weekend Berlin returns on May 2 for its 21st edition, showcasing the quality and diversity of the city’s art scene. Courtesy Galeria Plan B Cluj, Berlin Photo: Dacian Groza

Since it launched in 2005, Gallery Weekend Berlin has become one of the most highly anticipated art events on the global calendar and is widely regarded as the best time to catch up with what’s happening in the vibrant Berlin art scene. Returning this year from May 2-4, the city-wide festival will see fifty-two galleries staging some absolutely incredible shows featuring both established and emerging artists.

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Ahead of this year’s edition, Observer caught up with Antonia Ruder, who joined Gallery Weekend Berlin in 2023 and is now preparing for the first edition fully under her direction. The weekend gallery festival was created by a group of twenty-one galleries as a private initiative aimed at bringing attention to and fostering the popularity of the Berlin art scene, which was at the time at its peak. “They joined forces to bring people to the city, with this idea of community and solidarity—everyone pulled together the best shows of the year,” Ruder told Observer.

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Gallery Weekend Berlin has grown significantly; last year, fifty-five galleries mounted shows for the 20th-anniversary edition. Even so, the festival is choosy when selecting participants, which is necessary to ensure visitors who come to the city for the event only see the best of the best. “It’s important as a quantity proof that when one comes to the city, one will definitely see exciting and high profile shows,” Ruder said.

Since its founding, Gallery Weekend Berlin has served as a blueprint for similar festivals worldwide—Beijing, Chicago, Los Angeles and other municipalities host similar events. What sets Berlin’s version apart, however, is that in the absence of an international art fair in the city, the gallery........

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