In twelve months and various eye-catchers through Potsdam’s cultural year

The new cultural year is still before us like blank paper. Soon it will be filled: with exhibitions, theater, dance, music, literature. What shouldn’t you miss? Here it is.

1 January

The year begins with a literary sensation: Julia Schoch joins in “Wild after a wild dream” the conclusion of her highly acclaimed trilogy “Portrait of a Woman”. The first two parts were about family and love, this time mainly about writing. She will present it on January 9th at the Palais Lichtenau, moderated by Denis Scheck.

The first anniversary is to be celebrated on January 10th: The Festival Eco film tourthe marathon runner among Brandenburg’s festivals, is entering its 20th year. She is touring the Mark until May 9th. “Expedition Arktis 2 – Diving at the North Pole” by Philipp Grieß and Manuel Ernst will be shown at the opening. There will also be a dazzling celebrity there, including biologist Antje Boetius, director of the Alfred Wegener Institute.

Come along to the Hans Otto Theater „Stern 111“ Lutz Seiler’s successful novel about the transformation period after 1989 comes to the stage. The premiere is January 31st. Esther Hattenbach directs.

2 February

Im Minsk Art House Big changes are coming in 2025: founding director Paola Malavassi is leaving, Anna Schneider is taking over. From 1. In February, the Minsk is showing art from the GDR again: until August 10th is under the title „Im Dialog“ Art from the GDR from the Hasso Plattner Collection can be seen: around 50 collection works by, among others, Gudrun Brüne, Hartwig Ebersbach, Bernhard Heisig, Johannes Heisig, Wolfgang Mattheuer, Stefan Plenkers, Gerhard Richter, Cornelia Schimmele and Ruth Wolf-Rehfeldt.

Things get abstract at the Barberini Museum in spring: from February 15th to May 18th “Cosmos Kandinsky. Geometric abstraction in the 20th century” spans six decades and aims to show how geometric abstraction in its various forms found new expression again and again in Europe and the USA.

3 March

At the end of the season, artistic director Antonello Manacorda is leaving the Potsdam Chamber Academy. On March 1st, his successor will introduce himself in the Nikolaisaal: oboist François Leleux conducts the 7th symphony concert. It’s about Paris, the title: “Clair de lune”.

Two new books by successful Potsdam authors will be published on March 13th. Book prize winner Antje Rávik Strubel is involved “The influence of pheasants” According to his own statement, he presented the first novel “that really has nothing to do with the East”. The story about the death of a theater director and a journalist is “a cheerful novel,” says Strubel. The publisher says: “light as a feather and razor-sharp”. Marc-Uwe Kling’s second part of the young adult novel is published on the same day “tracker”written with his daughters. Expect mystery, death and a lot of humor.

4 April

April is all about saying goodbye Antonello Manacorda. At the end of his farewell party there will be a grand opera: on April 28th he will conduct Carl Maria von Weber’s “Der Freischütz” as a concert performance in the Nikolaisaal. The maestro and his work then travel on to Paris, Baden-Baden and the Berlin Philharmonic. Also the student festival visual addictions looks for the distance: “Beyond” is the name of the 2025 edition, which, despite all financial difficulties, is scheduled to take place from April 23rd to 27th.

5 May

In 1991, the first ones took place in the courtyard on Gutenbergstrasse, which was then ready for demolition Potsdam Dance Days instead of. From May 13th to 25th, 2025, the dance festival will enter its 35th round. How extensive the program can be in times of savings lists and temporary funding is still unclear, but: There will be celebrations. In any case, Canadian choreographer Vanessa Goodman will travel from Vancouver to dance the factory building together with local and regional partners.

The Brandenburg Museum is venturing into completely new territory with its exhibition “Signals of power. Nauen, Kamina and Windhoek”on view from May 16th to November 2nd. The focus of the show is wireless telecommunications and its role during the German colonial period: It tells of the connection between Kamina (Togo), Windhoek (Namibia) and Nauen (Brandenburg). She wants to show how radio technology was used as an instrument of power and how colonial telecommunications structures continue to have an impact today.

Also Potsdam’s new one Green Visions Film Festival will take place a second time in 2025 under the direction of Dieter Kosslick: from May 22nd to May 25th. It is to be hoped that the environmental film festival will be able to do without a monster truck soundscape this time.

6 June

They are available from June 13th to 29th, 2025 Potsdam Sanssouci Music Festival under the motto “Grand Tour”: Potsdam should become the starting point for musical journeys, with new horizons in sight. Festival director Dorothee Oberlinger goes on an “Italian journey” with soprano Giulia Semenzato; Avi Avital, Evgeni Sviridov and Oberlinger’s Ensemble 1700 are also there. For its 15th birthday, the legendary bicycle concert invites you to the “Grand Tour de Potsdam”, on three tours named after the jerseys of the classic “Tour de France” cycling race.

7 July

The Literaturfestival Lit:Potsdam is repositioning itself behind the scenes in 2025 – and had to severely restrict the accompanying school program in 2024. Will there be even fewer exciting new places like the open air? Who will succeed project manager Sabine Haack? Many questions remain unanswered, but the period is certain: the festival will take place in 2025 from July 1st to 6th.

8 August

A Washhouse-Kinsommer There will also be 2025, the details are being planned. That is certain Festival Fritz Open Air on August 1st and 2nd: Mayberg, Zartmann, Ennio Blumengarten and Blond have announced so far.

And that Nikolai Hall Potsdam celebrates its birthday: The new building was opened on August 27, 2000, designed by the French architect Rudy Ricciotti. Twenty years later, the anniversary is to be celebrated with a week of celebrations from September 2nd to 7th. The highlight is an anniversary gala on September 5th with the German Film Orchestra Babelsberg and other prominent guests. And the audience should also have their say: In the run-up to the anniversary, they are invited to look back and forward.

9 September

The “Platte” was the heart of GDR social policy. Place of socialization and symbol of real socialist progress – until 1989. With the fall of the wall, prefabricated buildings became sites of painful transformations, a symbol of social decline and racist violence. They were waiting to be demolished and were being renovated or converted, including in Potsdam. In 2025, the Minsk will discover the slab’s museum worthiness: it wants to show how East German prefabricated buildings were negotiated in art in the group exhibition “Residential complex. Art and life in prefabricated buildings” from September 6th to Explore February 8, 2026.

10 October

2025 will be the European Poetry Slam Championships held in Germany for the first time. The semi-finals will take place in the washhouse on October 17th. Ten international poetry slam stars will gather in Schiffbauergasse and battle with each other. There is also an anniversary coming up at the wash house: The Oxymoron Dance Company Anja Kozik, one of the mainstays of the wash house, is turning 20. The celebration is expected to take place on October 23rd and 24th.

11 November

On November 18, 2024, the fashion designer Wolfgang Joop 80. The accompanying exhibition entitled “Contradiction” in the Potsdam Museum has been postponed several times – it is now scheduled to take place “in the second half of 2025”. Will the show be on display for Joop’s 81st? The Potsdam Art Space In any case, his sidekick for the big Joop break has already been scheduled: from September 27th to November 9th, designs by young designers in training who are working on their role model Joop will be on display there.

12 December

What will December 2025 look like in Potsdam’s culture? Given the looming austerity scenarios, no one knows. Where will cuts be made, what will be new? A lot of uncertainty hangs over this year. But one thing is certain: a magical animal will smooth the transition after 2026. The unicorn show “The Mythical Animal in Art” can be seen at the Barberini Museum from October 25, 2025 to February 1, 2026.

The unicorn has stimulated the imagination like no other animal. It has been known to many cultures for centuries and its fascination continues to this day. The mythical animal is a complex symbol; it invites many associations. The trace of the unicorn can be seen in Christian and non-European art, in natural science and medicine. How exactly is what the Barberini Museum wants to explore at the end of the year.