Villa Aurora Night
Reception
About 400 guests from the worlds of culture, politics, and the media gathered on Monday evening at the Museum of Photography at Bahnhof Zoo to celebrate Villa Aurora Night. This year, the event was held in cooperation with the Alfred Herrhausen Society and the Art Library – State Museums of Berlin.
Following the opening remarks by the Director General of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Prof. Dr. Michael Eissenhauer, which also introduced the planned transatlantic exhibition “Renaissance and Reformation: Art in the Age of the Reformation,” John B. Emerson, U.S. Ambassador to Germany, delivered a speech in which he commented, among other things, on current developments in the U.S. election campaign. Dr. Sigrid Bias-Engels, group leader at the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, outlined the activities surrounding the upcoming Luther project in Germany, and Dr. Andreas Görgens, head of the Culture and Communication Department at the Federal Foreign Office, explained the ministry’s commitment to the transatlantic Luther projects in 2017.
Historian Professor Heinrich August Winkler and Tagesspiegel editor Dr. Christoph von Marschall discussed the implications for the future of U.S.-Europe relations in light of developments in the election campaign.
As part of the event, the artist duo M+M presented their current exhibition “7 Days” at the Museum of Photography, and Villa Fellow Udo Moll performed his piece “Selectron Souls,” which was created at Villa Aurora.