Berlin's future Museum of Modern Art, now called "berlin modern," celebrated its topping-out ceremony on Friday after completing the building's shell construction. The massive concrete structure at the Kulturforum near Potsdamer Platz is set to become Germany's most expensive museum ever, with costs expected to reach 500 million euros, though critics warn it could balloon to 600 million euros by its planned 2029 opening.
The ceremony featured performances, musical accompaniment, and speeches from key figures including Federal Minister of Culture Wolfram Weimer, Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation President, the architect, construction officials, and museum directors. All speakers emphasized the project's openness, campus character, accessibility, and transparency. However, the reality presents a stark contradiction between these lofty ideals and the imposing concrete mountain that has emerged behind construction fences.
Museum Director Klaus Biesenbach, along with other officials, has overseen a project that exemplifies what critics see as a fundamental contradiction in German cultural policy. The building, originally called the Museum of the Modern, then the Museum of the 20th Century, and finally renamed "berlin modern" after lengthy disputes, represents Germany's tendency to construct massive stone monuments to house fluid, boundary-crossing contemporary arts.
The architectural design creates what amounts to a simulation of urban space within the concrete structure. The building's interior features wandering halls, rest areas, natural lighting, a café, a restaurant, and a cinema – essentially recreating the amenities of a city plaza inside what critics describe as an "elephantine" saddle-roof construction. Museum spaces orbit around this central area like planets around a dying star, creating a science-fiction-like atmosphere in its raw state.
Despite the enormous scale, the space allocation reveals questionable priorities. Joseph Beuys's intricately puzzling installation "Das Kapital" will be housed in a 33-foot-high hall with a strip of light falling from above, resembling a funeral parlor. Meanwhile, 4,950 square feet has been reserved for Gerhard Richter's works in a cube above the entrance hall. Yet only about half of the building's 172,000 square feet of usable space will actually serve museum purposes, highlighting how the structure simultaneously hoards and wastes space.
The financial implications are staggering when compared to the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation's annual budget. While the building may consume 600 million euros, the foundation has only about 6 million euros annually for all exhibitions across the State Museums. This represents just one-hundredth of the building's total cost, raising serious questions about resource allocation and priorities.
The project's timing appears increasingly problematic as museums worldwide have begun mobilizing their collections and seeking greater public engagement. Art is moving out of traditional warehouse-like spaces and into communities, seeking direct contact with audiences. However, Germany continues to dream of creating a "MoMA on the Spree," building what critics call a "cultural tanker" that grows ever wider but no more mobile.
The berlin modern represents a broader trend in German cultural policy that constructs false baroque palaces and massive stone containers to celebrate the supposed worldliness, boundlessness, and fluidity of the arts. Instead of embracing the aesthetic revolution, these projects create monumental tombs for it. The museum has sealed off what was once an open piazza with this elephantine structure, though it attempts to recreate plaza-like qualities inside through artificial means.
As construction continues toward the 2029 opening, when the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation's classical modern collections are scheduled to anchor here, the project serves as a symbol of misplaced priorities. While the building grows ever more expensive and imposing, the actual mission of making art accessible and engaging with contemporary audiences seems to recede further into the background. The concrete mountain stands as a testament to Germany's continued attachment to grandiose cultural monuments, even as the art world moves toward more flexible, community-oriented approaches.
