Year in Review 2025

In 2025, the Cultural Foundation Schloss Wiepersdorf had the pleasure of welcoming outstanding fellows, groups, and numerous guests. Long-standing events such as the Spring Festival and the Christmas Concert were complemented by new formats, including the Art Workshop for Children, which during the summer months offered children the opportunity to explore their creativity and experiment with a variety of painting and craft techniques. For the first time, the foundation also organized a historical cycling tour to mark International Museum Day, led by Elisa Pavin and taking participants through the Bärwalde region.

The 2025 program featured a wide range of performances, including those by the Chinese-German theatre collective Nomadic Minutes; the guitar-cello Duo Shiluv; Musethica e.V., which brought the international young string ensembles Beija-flor String Quartet and Ensemble Finale to the region; artist and fellow Markus Himmel; the Ukrainian vocal ensemble Alter Ratio; and Wiepersdorf alumna Manami Nagahari, whose work “Mi-mi-mi Neunte” celebrated its German premiere at Wiepersdorf. A full house in the Tankhalle was drawn by the reading performance “Three East German Women Get Drunk and Found the Ideal State”, in which Wiepersdorf fellow Paula Fürstenberg stepped in at short notice for Annett Gröschner and appeared alongside Peggy Mädler and Wenke Seemann as the “third East German woman”.

Further readings by Wiepersdorf fellows included Paula Fürstenberg presenting her novel “Weltalltage”, Sandra Pixberg and Bettina Gärtner discussing unrest and new beginnings, and Ursula Knoll reading from her new novel project “Das Loch”. Academic lectures also formed part of the program: Dr. Barbara Steingießer spoke on play and games in the “Journal des Luxus und der Moden”; fellow Tabea Lamberti presented her research on Christa Wolf’s reception of Romanticism; and fellow Lukas Zittlau introduced the thought of the GDR philosopher Wolfgang Heise on the occasion of his 100th birthday. On several dates, the artists’ studios were once again opened to the public, offering insights into working processes and the latest works by the current cohort of visual-arts fellows.

In addition, the Cultural Foundation Schloss Wiepersdorf was a guest this year at the Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz, where, together with Prof. Dr. Marcel Lepper, it hosted a reading by Wiepersdorf fellow Dr. Gunnar Decker from his book “Rilke in der Schweiz”. The foundation also appeared at the Lettrétage with a conversation between author Jakob Kraner, a 2024 fellow, and translator and writer Ann Cotten.

Impressions from the events can be found in the following image gallery. The team of the Schloss Wiepersdorf Cultural Foundation looks forward to the cultural program in 2026 and to welcoming visitors back to Wiepersdorf in the new year.