Through poetry and movement, Bella and Dira share their first experiences of queer self-discovery. As part of the Indonesian queer diaspora, they navigate themes of migration, loneliness, and belonging. When they meet, they find connection, support, and a sense of grounding in each other. Sound design by Dea Karina. Logan February's works explore desire, spirituality, and Afro-queer identity in poetry, essays, performance, film, and translation. In German translation by Christian Filips, the volume "Mental Voodoo" was published in 2024 by Urs Engeler Verlag. Logan February will read from their poems.

In cooperation with Haus für Poesie

BOOKED OUT
Free of charge. Limited capacity. The performance is part of the multi-part performance series "feeling backwards, across tongues." The next event is scheduled for February 5, 2026.

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Logan February, Photo: Diana Pfammatter; Bella & Dira, Photo: @soyboy_photography/soy prabhawat

Charmaine Poh studied Visual and Media Anthropology at Freie Universität Berlin and is writing her doctoral thesis supervised by Prof. Annette Jael Lehmann. In a lecture organised by Freie Universität Berlin together with MetaLAB (Harvard, Berlin, Basel), the artist will speak about the background of her current exhibition Make a travel deep of your inside, and don't forget me to take. "Heavy is the root of light", a quote from the Daoist text Dao De Jing as well as installation and work title by Charmaine Poh is prominently displayed in the rotunda of PalaisPopulaire. Based on this, Charmaine Poh will discuss the philosophical foundations in her work during her lecture.

In cooperation with Freie Universität Berlin and MetaLab Harvard

The exhibition is open before and after the lecture.

REGISTRATION HERE or via email: regina.ziegler@fu-berlin.de
Free of charge. Limited capacity.

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Photo: Charmaine Poh

We are thrilled to close our performance series "feeling backwards, across tongues" with a live work by Charmaine Poh. Her performance 'Godmother' complements the exhibition’s central video piece, "The Moon is Wet," which threads marginalised stories found in Singapore across time. Centred on how the sea embodies desire, the work reminds us of the cracks in current systems and gestures toward other ways of being.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. Limited capacity. Last appointment of the performance series "feeling backwards, across tongues."

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Videostill: Charmaine Poh, The Moon is Wet, 2025 © Charmaine Poh

One of our final conventional FreeTours of Charmaine Poh’s exhibition will be extraordinary. Led by drag queen Cali Harburg (sofa queen, intellectual, philosopher, and migrant), this tour offers insights into the background, concepts, and highlights of Make a travel deep of your inside, and don’t forget me to take from a queer perspective. A special focus will be placed on the video work "What’s softest in the world runs and rushes over what’s hardest in the world" (2024) as well as on the almost forgotten stories of the Majies — a group of migrant women from Southeast China.

TICKETS HERE
Price: 5€. Limited capacity. In English.

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Foto: Cali Harburg

One of our final conventional FreeTours of Charmaine Poh’s exhibition will be extraordinary. Led by drag queen Cali Harburg (sofa queen, intellectual, philosopher, and migrant), this tour offers insights into the background, concepts, and highlights of Make a travel deep of your inside, and don’t forget me to take from a queer perspective. A special focus will be placed on the video work What’s softest in the world runs and rushes over what’s hardest in the world as well as on the almost forgotten stories of the Majies — a group of migrant women from Southeast China.

TICKETS HERE
Price: 5€. Limited capacity. In German.

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Photo: Cali Harburg

The next edition of the film series OnView is dedicated to the theme of Power. The program kicks off with a concert by Yuriy Gurzhy & The Beetroots, who will perform as a quartet in the evening. Yuriy Gurzhy is a musician, composer, DJ, author, and a powerful voice in post-migrant pop modernity. His new music feels like the soundtrack of a search for identity: at once Ukrainian and Jewish, infused with punk, reggae, disco, and hip-hop. In this way, the evening’s power unfolds — vibrant, intense, and resolute.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. Limited capacity.

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Photo: Nico Sauer

Sprachcafés are places for meeting others – for people who want to practice and improve their German or simply feel like meeting other Berliners.

As part of the film series OnView - Power, visitors can participate in a Sprachcafé at PalaisPopulaire. Each meeting will focus on one of the films shown and offer the opportunity to exchange thoughts on themes such as power, strength, and control. The meetings will be led by Dóra Sági, an expert in German in multilingual contexts and aesthetic language education. Whether young or old, new or long-time Berliner – everyone is welcome at the language café to discuss art, society, and personal experiences over a hot drink and cake.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. In German.

How can even a small movement of an individual extend beyond their own body and influence the community? As part of the film program OnView – Power, this workshop series, invites participants to explore their own physical strength and collective experiences of movement. The focus is on complicated areas such as freedom and security, solidarity and self-assertion, as well as consent and resistance. It's about the experience of moving within a group, or consciously striking out on your own path. Starting from one's own body and incorporating space, the workshop jointly investigates how community emerges and how movement affects others. The workshop is led by performance artist and choreographer Patricia Woltmann and dancer and choreographer Viviana Defazio. 

Using simple choreographic rules, participants explore how proximity, distance, and space are perceived, how physical listening emerges, and how individual movements influence group dynamics. At the conclusion of the workshop series, the results will be presented as a sharing event on April 12th, the last Sunday of the film program. 

TICKETS HERE
Price: € 20, reduced € 15. Limited Capacity. In German.
Please register by March 2nd, 2026. More information can be found on the registration page.
For everyone with some dance experience and/or curiosity about body awareness.

In the chamber music series “Workshop.Dialogue.Music” at the PalaisPopulaire, members of the Berliner Philharmoniker introduce themselves and their instruments and talk in a relaxed atmosphere about the works presented, their interpretations, and their approach. Questions and a dialogue with the audience are expressly encouraged! The concert will be followed by a guided tour of the exhibition.

The film series On View – Power illuminates the various facets of power and reflects on different interpretations of might, strength, force, control, or their opposing counterparts. With Women Power, the Berlin Philharmonic musicians Johanna Pichlmair (violin), Matic Kuder (clarinet), and Barbara Kehrig (bassoon) focus on works by female composers that are still rarely found in concert programs today. Hindered by husbands and fathers or subjected to societal constraints, female composers developed strategies and an inner strength that enabled them to compose and also bring their work to performance. In addition to Hildegard von Bingen, Clara Schumann, Fanny Hensel, Nadja and Lilly Boulanger, or Sofia Gubaidulina, who are widely known today, there are many female composers whose works are rarely performed, including numerous works for string instruments or piano, and occasionally compositions for wind instruments. Many of these works deal with religion and current events: Konstanzia Gourzi embeds the events in the Balkans in her work Angel, Six Miniatures for Peace for solo bassoon into a historical context, to preserve it from oblivion and to give the audience the opportunity to reflect on what has happened and draw conclusions for today. Lera Auerbach's work T'filah for solo violin is a reaction to the Holocaust tragedy. T'filah means prayer in Hebrew. To pray means to ask questions, to confront one's inner voices and contradictions, and in this confrontation, to find answers, if they exist at all.

BOOKED OUT
Price: € 22 incl. French breakfast
Free choice of seats on site. Doors open from 10:30 am.

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Matic Kude, Johanna Pichlmair and Barbara Kehrig, Photos: Stefan Hoederath

As part of the film series OnView - Power, visitors can participate in a Sprachcafé at PalaisPopulaire. Each meeting will focus on one of the films shown and offer the opportunity to exchange thoughts on themes such as power, strength, and control. The meetings will be led by Dóra Sági, an expert in German in multilingual contexts and aesthetic language education. Whether young or old, new or long-time Berliner – everyone is welcome at the language café to discuss art, society, and personal experiences over a hot drink and cake.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. In German.

Just as form and content are uniquely intertwined in the artworks of the exhibition Seeing Words, Reading Images, the relationship between text and form often plays a central role in literature as well. Many of the artists represented in the exhibition – including Etel Adnan, Shilpa Gupta, and Herta Müller – have also written literary works. Accordingly, a reading event is an essential part of the accompanying program: Katharina von Uslar and Edgar Rai will present texts where form is not merely a means but part of the content, shaping the reading experience.

In cooperation with the Uslar & Rai bookstore.

TICKETS HERE
Cost: 9€ Limited Capacity. In German

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Photo: Edgar Rai & Katharina von Uslar

As part of the exhibition Seeing Words, Reading Images, visitors can participate in a Sprachcafé at PalaisPopulaire. Each meeting will focus on one of the art works on display and offer the opportunity to exchange thoughts on themes such as foreign language, writing, and shared experiences. The meetings will be led by Dóra Sági, an expert in German in multilingual contexts and aesthetic language education. Whether young or old, new or long-time Berliner – everyone is welcome at the language café to discuss art, society, and personal experiences over a hot drink and cake.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. In German.

As part of the exhibition Seeing Words, Reading Images, visitors can participate in a Sprachcafé at PalaisPopulaire. Each meeting will focus on one of the art works on display and offer the opportunity to exchange thoughts on themes such as foreign language, writing, and shared experiences. The meetings will be led by Dóra Sági, an expert in German in multilingual contexts and aesthetic language education. Whether young or old, new or long-time Berliner – everyone is welcome at the language café to discuss art, society, and personal experiences over a hot drink and cake.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. In German.

Berlin's literary scene is on the move: traditional publishing houses have returned to the city, and numerous new publishers have emerged. We want to dedicate a special event format at the PalaisPopulaire to both: "writers’stage – New Literature from Berlin." Katharina von Uslar and Edgar Rai select the most exciting voices from the latest publishing programs, introduce the authors, and discuss their new novels with them.

In cooperation with the Uslar & Rai bookstore

TICKETS HERE
Cost: 9€. Limited Capacity. In German.

In the chamber music series “Workshop.Dialogue.Music” at the PalaisPopulaire, members of the Berliner Philharmoniker introduce themselves and their instruments and talk in a relaxed atmosphere about the works presented, their interpretations, and their approach. Questions and a dialogue with the audience are expressly encouraged! The concert will be followed by a guided tour of the exhibition.

Price: € 22 incl. French breakfast
Free choice of seats on site. Ticket sale starts on April 21st, 2026.

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Photo: Mathias Schormann

As part of the exhibition Seeing Words, Reading Images, visitors can participate in a Sprachcafé at PalaisPopulaire. Each meeting will focus on one of the art works on display and offer the opportunity to exchange thoughts on themes such as foreign language, writing, and shared experiences. The meetings will be led by Dóra Sági, an expert in German in multilingual contexts and aesthetic language education. Whether young or old, new or long-time Berliner – everyone is welcome at the language café to discuss art, society, and personal experiences over a hot drink and cake.

REGISTRATION HERE
Free of charge. In German.

Who is in the running for Germany's most coveted book prize? Katharina von Uslar and Edgar Rai present the six nominees in the final round of the German Book Prize 2026.

In cooperation with the Uslar & Rai bookstore

TICKETS HERE
Price: 9€. Limited capacity. In German.

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Photo: Edgar Rai & Katharina von Uslar