YOKO ONO: DREAM TOGETHER
Duration April 11, 2025 - September 14, 2025
Location New National Gallery
Yoko Ono: Dream Together is an exhibition with works from all phases of ono's groundbreaking artistic career.
The exhibition invites the audience to actively participate beyond the pure consideration - both physically and mentally. The actions often begin on an individual level, then develop into wider, collective actions and thus demonstrate the transformative strength of common action for peace and to imagine a better world.
Ono's works ask for joint actions: repair, restore, clean, wish, imaginating, dream. Before entering the exhibition, visitors are invited to get involved with Cleaning Piece (1996) for a moment of self -reflection. The sorting of river stones from the region should encourage thinking about your own joys and worries. This is followed by an instruction to the folding of paper cranes for peace that gradually fill the exhibition space. In Mend Piece (1966), the audience participates in an act of repairing: Broken tones can be put together here and "wisdom and love restored". At the center of the exhibition is the installation Play it by Trust (1966/1991), a large chess table, where up to 20 players can devote themselves to the almost impossible task of playing a game with only white chess figures. The instruction is "to play as long as you still know where your own characters are".
At Sky / Water (1999), the audience is invited to take a single piece of a sky puzzle that leads them into an area of the exhibition where it is about works that are dedicated to the pursuit of peace. This includes the famous Bed-in for Peace in Amsterdam, documented in the film Mr. & Mrs. Lennon's Honeymoon (1969), or the ongoing project with newspaper advertisements that was over! If you want it (1969) began. A almost dozen newspaper copies reflect the collective call of the artists to peace and at the same time record the condition of the world on these special days. A clear connection to Berlin is over! If you want it was manufactured in West Berlin 1969. Hiroshima Sky is Always Blue (1995), which was recorded to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Hiroshima's 50th anniversary of the 50th anniversary of the 50th anniversary, plays in another exhibition room For Ono, who lived in Japan at the time, this was a drastic experience - an event that had a lasting impact on her lifelong commitment to world peace. Outside, in front of the iconic building, designed by Mies van der Rohe, a single Wish Tree (1996), is a connection point at the same time at the same time.
Yoko Ono: Dream Together, curated by Klaus Biesenbach, Connor Monahan and Jon Hendricks, is shown on the occasion of the Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind overview, which can be seen in Gropius Bau from April 11 to August 31, 2025. At the same time, the new Berliner Kunstverein (NBK) presents the Yoko Ono plant from March 2 to August 31, 2025 as part of the NBK Billboard series.
The exhibition is made possible by the FRIENDS of the Nationalgalerie.
A special exhibition at the Nationalgalerie – Berlin State Museums.