14:00: Walk through the exhibition FIRE. From the Cosmos to the Commons with City Curator Hamburg Joanna Warsza including presentation of the last chapter of the work The Chain Reaction with the artists Mark Morris & Arjun Panayal as well as the Performative Reading Cycle of Warmth by the artist Lene Markusen
at the St. Nikolai Memorial
15:15: Act I (Le rachat des cloches) by Billy Bultheel played live on carillon by Werner Lamm
at the St. Nikolai Memorial
16:00: Finissage & Artist talk with Andrey Klassen and the curator Anna Nowak in the frame of his exhibition Nobody Ran at the project space Admiralitätstraße 75
Our summer 2026 public art exhibition FIRE. From the Cosmos to the Commons in collaboration with the St. Nikolai Memorial is dedicated to the element of Fire, the apocalypse and the repair. FIRE presents a series of public art commissions of both Hamburg-based as well as the international artists, dealing with the political, ecological, and spiritual reading of fire in the times of political urgency. It addresses the current pervasive feeling of impending catastrophe, asking, how to turn poison into medicine, confusion into strength, loss into renewal and resilience.
The exhibition takes place at the St. Nikolai Memorial; a former church located in the heart of Hamburg and destroyed by flames two times in its history. Never rebuilt after the World War II, it is now a place of remembrance and encounter, offering a space to learn about what causes wars. Each day, it welcomes thousands of visitors, linking the memory of destruction and the irreparable damage with hope and the collective will to mend.
In that context the contemporary works of public art, presented in the most democratic, accessible and complex manner, ask how to find a way out from the vicious cycle of destruction and renewal towards a non-violent planetary co-existence.
FIRE. From the Cosmos to the Commons at the St. Nikolai Memorial.
Curated by Joanna Warsza, City Curator Hamburg
21.6. – 21.9.2026
Satellite projects:
Nobody Ran by Andrey Klassen, Kunsthaus Hamburg at the project space Admiralitätstraße 75
Curated by Anna Nowak, Managing and Artistic Director Kunsthaus Hamburg
7.6. – 20.9.2026
Sunflower Fields by Agnes Denes, Environmental Art installation at the Hammaburg-Platz
Curated by Joanna Warsza, City Curator Hamburg
21.6. – 21.9.2026
