Alex Baczyński-Jenkins: Malign Junction (Goodbye, Berlin)

On March 14 and 15, Gropius Bau kicks off the spring programme with Malign Junction (Goodbye, Berlin), a performance developed specifically for the atrium of Gropius Bau by artist and choreographer Alex Baczyński-Jenkins. The new piece gestures towards Christopher Isherwood’s 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin, set in the final days of Berlin’s nightlife and cabaret culture during the rise of fascism. Berlin functions both as a specific location and as a site of projection—embodying histories of state violence, transformation, life within countercultures, concepts of freedom and endings. The choreography unfolds as an unspectacular “grand finale”, with performers dancing on the edge of an ending: the performance navigates the tensions between loss, anger, seduction, the uncanny and ecstatic abandon.

“We are delighted to welcome the start of spring with Alex Baczyński-Jenkins’ Malign Junction (Goodbye, Berlin). As an artist working at the intersection of dance, sound and performance, he sets the tone for our new programme, which focuses on performative and other discursive and live formats alongside ‘classical’ exhibitions. In this way, we want to engage a diverse audience and expand the idea of an exhibition space. In order to further shape Gropius Bau together with artists from within, we invited Alex Baczyński-Jenkins and his performers into our studios to develop the piece specifically for the heart of the exhibition space—our atrium.” —Jenny Schlenzka, Director of Gropius Bau

Through intimate and fragmentary exchanges between the performers, Alex Baczyński-Jenkins’ choreographies explore the structures and politics of desire. His work is deeply relational, which is rooted in the collaborative ways in which it is developed and performed, as well as in its choreographic material. This includes tracing relations between sensation and sociality, embodied expression and alienation, everyday experience, the utopian and latent queer histories. Baczyński-Jenkins is also the co-founder of Kem, a Warsaw-based queer feminist collective focused on choreography, performance and sound that interfaces with social practice. Through various experimental formats and community building, Kem engages in critical intimacy and queer pleasure.

About Alex Baczyński-Jenkins
Alex Baczyński-Jenkins has presented work in group exhibitions at Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid (2023), MACBA, Barcelona (2023), Kölnischer Kunstverein (2023), Ludwig Forum Aachen (2023), Kiasma, Helsinki (2022) and Lafayette Anticipations, Paris (2022). 

His solo exhibitions were on view at Kunsthalle Basel (2019), Foksal Gallery Foundation, Warsaw (2018) and Chisenhale Gallery, London (2017). His work has also been presented at the 58th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia (2019), Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2019), Migros Museum of Contemporary Art, Zürich (2018), Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2017), Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw (2017), Swiss Institute, New York (2016), Muzeum Sztuki in Łódź (2016) and Liste Art Fair, Basel (2014). Baczyński-Jenkins’ debut features film Such Feeling premiered at the New Horizons Film Festival and the Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw (2024). He was the recipient of the Frieze Artist Award and the Arts Foundation Award in 2018. He was nominated for the Future Generation Art Prize in 2021.

As a prelude to Malign Junction (Goodbye Berlin), Yvonne Rainer’s film Journeys from Berlin/1971 (1980)—a major inspiration for Baczyński-Jenkins’ work—will be shown in the Gropius Bau cinema on March 13. The screening will begin with an introduction from art historian and publisher Sabeth Buchmann, kicking off a new monthly event series with Arsenal—Institute for Film and Video. Journeys from Berlin/1971 unfolds as a witty meditation on state authority, oppression, violence and revolution. US choreographer and dancer Yvonne Rainer conceived the idea during a residency in Berlin from 1976 to 1977. 

Alex Baczyński-Jenkins: Malign Junction (Goodbye, Berlin) is curated by Nora-Swantje Almes, Curator Live Programme and Outreach, with Alexandra Philippovskaya, Assistant Curator Live Programme and Outreach, and Edessa Malke, Curatorial Fellow Live Programme and Outreach.