FRAMED FEST – EXHIBITION, CONCERTS, PERFORMANCES, LECTURES & WORKSHOPS
june 2025 / July 2024
FRAMED FEST takes place at the historic Wasserturm Prenzlauer Berg and brings together music, visual art, dance, and discourse in a unique site-specific format. At its core lies one curatorial principle: the duet as dialogue — between artists, disciplines, cultures, and audiences.
The first festival edition in July 2024 transformed the Wasserturm into a stage for newly created musical and choreographic duets. Artists such as Keren Ann, Marcin Masecki, and Sebastian Studnitzky collaborated in unique constellations developed especially for the space. The poetry exhibition ADRESSEN, curated by Dr. Noam Gal, extended the duet concept into language — conceiving poetry itself as an act of listening and exchange. By opening the tower daily to the public, rehearsals and works in progress became part of the experience, making the creative process visible.
In June 2025, FRAMED FEST returned with an expanded program. At its center stood HOMESICK, the first neon poetry exhibition by internationally renowned artist Yael Bartana. Her luminous text works, exploring origin, displacement, and belonging, formed a conceptual counterpart to the musical encounters. International artists including Avishai Cohen, Vincent Peirani, and Émile Parisien presented exclusive duet formations spanning jazz, classical, and contemporary music.
Workshops, talks, and the format FRAMED CIRCLE complemented the artistic program, inviting audiences to engage more deeply with themes of trauma, transformation, and collective presence.
With over 25 international artists and thinkers, the festival creates a unique space for artistic dialogue, healing, and connection in an intimate atmosphere with only 100 people per concert.
Festival program 2025
ART: HOMESICK by Yael Bartana - Exhibition
Curator: Noam Gal
Along the thirty years of creating her internationally acclaimed film works, Yael Bartana has repeatedly engaged with another medium in her exhibitions: neon — a material that still awaits broader public and critical attention.
For FRAMED FEST, Bartana was commissioned to create a new neon work, HOMESICK — the first artwork specially commissioned by FRAMED. This new piece not only anchors the presentation but also gives the exhibition its title.
Neon statements that once served as titles for Bartana’s film projects, written by the characters themselves, now take precedence within the nearly 150-year-old Wasserturm Prenzlauer Berg. Against the tower’s layered history — from municipal reservoir to Nazi detention site to sealed vault beneath a public park — these illuminated texts fuse thought with electricity, two energies traditionally associated with enlightenment and progress.
In this intense, cool architectural setting, Bartana’s slogans unfold as more than artistic gestures: they read as calls for collective reflection and action. They question our understanding of history, the urgency of utopia, the gendered dimension of crisis, and our failure to take our own “dreams” seriously — particularly at a time of eroding humanist ideals.
Drawing on the traditions of conceptualism and minimalism, the neon works transcend the conventional art object as their light expands into the surrounding space. While they echo the aesthetics of commercial signage, here these fluorescent mottos retain their status as pure ideas — thoughts to carry with us, even in uncertain times.
MUSIC:
FRAMED FEST’s concert program centers on the duet as a space of encounter. By bringing artists together in carefully curated constellations, the festival creates intimate dialogues that transcend genre boundaries — between jazz and classical, tradition and experimentation, music, movement, and visual art. Each evening unfolded as a unique and unrepeatable experience shaped by the chemistry of the artists and the atmosphere of the Wasserturm.
Among the remarkable encounters were Noa and Mira Awad, whose powerful vocal dialogue bridged cultures with sensitivity and depth. Harel Shachal and Kaveh Sarvarian created a vibrant cross-cultural exchange, weaving together jazz language and Middle Eastern musical influences in a dynamic and expressive interplay.
Vincent Peirani and Émile Parisien brought their celebrated duo to the festival, combining virtuosity, humor, and poetic subtlety in a constantly evolving musical conversation.
The album release of Gravitation by Haggai Cohen-Milo, together with Emma Rawicz on saxophone and James Shipp on vibraphone, expanded the duet concept into a fluid trio constellation — rhythmically intricate and sonically immersive.
The encounter between Meg Stuart and Doug Weiss, joined by Mariana Carvalho, dissolved the boundaries between concert and performance art, allowing movement and sound to enter into direct dialogue.
Violinist Guy Braunstein and video artist Lillevan created an audiovisual performance in which classical virtuosity met live visual composition in real time.
Sandra Carrasco and Alex Conde explored the intensity of flamenco enriched by contemporary harmonic language, while Dilek Türkan and Thomas Moked Blum bridged Anatolian musical heritage with modern compositional textures.
Across all performances, FRAMED FEST remained true to its philosophy: free of rigid genre definitions and guided by artistic excellence and authentic exchange. Each evening stood on its own — special, intimate, and shaped by a shared commitment to deep listening and meaningful connection.
FRAMED CIRCLE: workshops & lectures
A human, holistic circle around FRAMED FEST.
FRAMED CIRCLE offers and researches the possible meeting points between art/music and healing. We are under the impression that these two worlds are connected, both from the artist’s side and the audiences.
With FRAMED CIRCLE we wish to deepen and strengthen our offering by providing a wide range of workshops and lectures with specialists (s.a Dr Peter Levine and Dr Nir Brosh) in the fields of trauma work, transformation, healing, Mind-body relation, S.E, Movement research, and more.
FRAMED CIRCLE will hold spiritual, educational, and healing space for everyone joining FRAMED FEST.
Dr Peter A Levine – Pre-recorded video Interview and Panel Talk with Framed Circle curators
Lecture / Workshop on psychedelic plant healing – KIYUMI
Somatic Experiencing private sessions – Franziska Dieterich and Jochen Stechmann
Festival program 2024
MUSIC & PERFORMING ART:
From 19–28 July 2024, the first edition of FRAMED FEST took place at the historic Wasserturm Prenzlauer Berg, presenting concerts, performances, workshops, and a poetry exhibition. This was the first festival ever held in the Wasserturm.
The program focused on unique musical and choreographic duets. International artists such as Keren Ann, Roni Alter, Sophy Soulvau, Marcin Masecki, and Sebastian Studnitzky collaborated with dancers and choreographers including Sally Cowdin, Annick Schadeck, Natalia Palshina, and Giorgia Bovo to create one-hour performances specifically for the festival.
ART EXHIBITION:
The poetry exhibition ADRESSEN, curated by Noam Gal, explored attentive listening, giving, and receiving. As Gal explains, “We can imagine a duet in the form of a poem — feelings from one creative mind reaching another, moving across languages, voices, times, and places.”
To break down barriers between artists and audiences, the Wasserturm was open daily from 12–4 pm, allowing visitors to experience both the exhibitions and rehearsals. This approach highlighted not only the creation of art but also the role of space itself as inspiration for artistic work.
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Visitor Information:
Tickets should be purchased in advance, as a maximum of 99 people, including the artists,
are allowed per concert.
Barrier-free. Accompanying persons for wheelchair users and children under the age of 12
are admitted free of charge.
Address: Wasserturm Prenzlauer Berg, Kleiner Wasserspeicher, Diedenhofer Str. 20, 10405 Berlin
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