Fresh off last week’s long-awaited release of the album Donda, the 22-time Grammy award winner Kanye West was spotted today in Berlin, touring many of the city’s most iconic art venues. These included the Pergamon Museum, the Julia Stoschek Collection, the Boros collection, an exhibition in Germany’s most famous club, Berghain, and the KW Institute for Contemporary Art.
West was first spotted with an entourage by a Bild photographer outside a hotel in Berlin’s Mitte district, wearing his now iconic full-face mask with just two small slits for his eyes.
During his tour at KW, West was photographed wearing merchandise from the museum bearing his initials. He was accompanied by two of the institution's curators, Anna Gritz and Léon Kruijswijk, who led him through an exhibition of the Berlin-based artist Michael Stevenson.
“Kanye seems to have chimed into Michael's ability to analyse institutions of power in light of the infrastructural systems that condition these disciplines,” Gritz told The Art Newspaper.
Michael Stevenson's Serene Velocity in Practice: MC510/CS183 (2017/21) as part of his exhibition at the KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin Courtesy of the artist, Michael Lett Gallery, Auckland, and Fine Arts, Sydney. Photo: Andrea Rossetti
Apparently West interested in a work called to Serene Velocity in Practice: MC510/CS183, a sculptural installation that reflects on two unrelated university courses, one taught by Peter Thiel, the controversial libertarian financier, and another by the Evangelical Christian pastor John Wimber, a founder of the neocharismatic Vineyard churches. “Kanye seems to have resonated with how this work deconstructs the distribution notions of industry, power and faith, through academic institutions and the media,” Gritz said.
West, 44, is no stranger to the realm of contemporary art; he was even said to have chosen Louise Bourgeois for the Donda album art. To date, however, Donda has no official album artwork, with only a black square accompanying the release on major streaming platforms like Apple Music and Spotify. Malevich references aside, this has left some to speculate whether West’s visit to the German capital could be to finally secure some visuals for the album.