Skip to main content
A dark corridor, red light shines through a door at the end.

res·o·nant

A Light and Sound Installation by Mischa Kuball at the Jewish Museum Berlin

The Jewish Museum Berlin exhibited res·o·nant – a walk-through light and sound installation by the Düsseldorf conceptual artist Mischa Kuball. Kuball created the installation specially for the new exhibition space on the lower ground floor of the Libeskind building.

Past exhibition

Map with all buildings that belong to the Jewish Museum Berlin. The Libeskind building is marked in green

Where

Libeskind Building, lower level, Rafael Roth Gallery
Lindenstraße 9–14, 10969 Berlin

A light floods the room with blueish-purple light

Rotating mirror elements and stroboscopic light impulses flood the rooms with light; photo: Ladislav Zajac/Archiv Mischa Kuball, Düsseldorf/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2017

Covering a total floor space of more than 350 square meters, res·o·nant incorporated two of the five vertical voids that perforate the Museum building. These symbolically laden empty spaces formed the starting point for the artist’s work, which referred to the materiality, effect and signification of the voids. Museum visitors had the opportunity to re-discover these two voids, which have become something of a Museum trademark since the opening of the Museum in 2001.

In these rooms with 24-meter-high ceilings, rotating projectors cast light fields in the form of the outline of the voids onto walls and ceiling. By means of rotating mirror elements and stroboscopic light impulses, there arised, in the words of the artist, a “resonance between architecture and skin.”

As an important element of the installation, several loudspeakers, distributed throughout the room, loop a series of 60-second-long sound clips – so-called Skits – which were composed specially for res·o·nant by more than 150 musicians.

Light illuminates the left side of the room in red, on the right you see the grey of the walls

Rotating projectors cast light fields onto walls and ceiling; photo: Ladislav Zajac/Archiv Mischa Kuball, Düsseldorf/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2017

Contributing musicians

John Zorn, Roedelius, Jürgen Paape, Stabil Elite, Thomas Fehlmann, Heiner Goebbels, Frank Bretschneider, Emmanuel Witzthum, Monika Werkstatt (AGF, Barbara Morgenstern, Beate Bartel, Danielle de Picciotto, Gudrun Gut, Islaja, Lucrecia Dalt, Pilocka Krach, Sonae), Ihor Holubizky, Kurt Dahlke aka Pyrolator, Filip Caranica, Pamela Z, Dee C’rell, Michael Scheibenreiter, Eberhard Kranemann, Andrew Pekler, Robert Kolinsky, Florian Bocksrucker, Alessandro Gaia, Karl Felix Bionek, Marlon T.L. Fink, Thomas Klein, Lucas Croon, Kobermann aka Johannes Piller, Hans W. Koch, Axel Heilhecker, Zafraan Ensemble, Minou Oram, BAR (Christina Irrgang und Lucas Coon), Kurt Hentschläger, Pasquale Ascione aka Ascion, Alma Quartet, Michele Pedrazzi, Florian Scheibein, Söhnlein Brilliant, Alex Wirth, XAMBUCA, Yejin Gil, Tim Schumacher aka DJ Normal 4, Midori Hirano, Anja Penner, Luis Negron, Opera Factory Freiburg & Holst-Sinfonietta, Ross Downes, Cass. / Niklas Rehme-Schlüter, Michal Zietara, Krzysztof Honowski, Hans Nieswandt, Ali Chakav, Olga Neuwirth, Alicia Svigals / Uli Geissendoerfer, Stephan Groß, Daniel Schellongowski, KEIDLER Klein/Paulick/Reihse/Weinrich, Giovanni Tepe, Yui Onodera, Michel Aniol, Michael Tschijow, Gischt und Misonica (Ventil), Stefan Oehm, Hilde Wollenstein, Cordula Ditz, Cornelia Friederike Müller aka CFM, Dora Tomic, Billy Davis, Elke Horner, Myroslava, Joshua Dirk, Detlef Klepsch, Hans Ackermann, Theresa Schrezenmeir, Daniel Martini, Iva Galovic, Angelo Custodio, Theerawat Klangjareonchai, Philip Albus, Nicola Anthony, Arvo Pärt / Carolyn Enger, Felipe Tofani, Anke Eckardt, Julie Sassoon, Aoi Swimming, Jens Standke, Dietmar Bonnen, Arturo Sezmer & Lorenzo Lagrava, Sam Genovese, The Marx Trukker, Penelope Phylactopoulos / Andrew Scheinman, Christoph Strathmann, Timur Novikov, Konstantin von Sichart / Gernot Wieland, Liad Vanounou, Stephan Mathieu, Amir Chasson, Valerian Maly & Klara Schilliger, Katrin von Chamier, Marcello Nass Ruggiero, Leonard Heifetz / Klezmer Yunan, Davide Luciani, Hilde Wollenstein & Wytze de Swart, Frank Kai & Wang Xuliang, Richard Harjit Hicks, Anthony D’Agostino, Sophia Dieckschaefer, SIGILLUM S, Bernd Jürgensen, David Fenech, Amijai Shalev, Gregory Kramer, Federico Federici, Bruno Franceschini, Hagai Izenberg, Luca Brignole, Marc Oller, Maria Blondeel, Oliver Salkic / Christian Nink / Constantin Herzig / Ellen Müller / Leonhard Huhn, Roland Kuit, Stefan Jürke, Stefan Thorsson, YM, Liz Helman, Jair-Rohm Parker Wells, Tim Gorinski, Lea Letzel, Gil Zablodovsky, Dominik Noé, Shaul Bustan, Charles Emmett Freeman / Deborah Patterson, Luca Forcucci, Daniela Georgieva / Pony, till baumann/the ritournelle project, Leon Butler, Phillip Schulze, Karlo Javorski, Rena Meyer Wiel, Rod Stasick, Stefano Pavarini aka POLDOTRONIX, Jadwiga Frej, Eric Vanounou, Frank Schulte, Marion Fabian, amigzaj/k2 (Andras Blazsek / Krisztian Kristof), Ensemble Medulla (Jagna Anderson, Dodi Helschinger, Lea Sövsö, Ulrike Sowodniok, Anna Weissenfels), Florian Wulff, Tiam Taheri, Reverse Mode, Mikyung Song, Anonymous, Alexander Kluge & Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann, Mai Linh, Martin Conrads, Nicolas Hermansen, Niko Mitsuko, Odysseas Klissouras & Alexandros Kontogeorgakopoulos, Olga Neuwirth, Pamela Heller, Paul Brody, Pina Ruecker, Plantanik, Ross Simonini, Sondermueller, Uli Schuster, Wu Siou Ming, Peter Weibel, DENZXL = Denzel Russell, Ralph Rubin x YEAH, Mike Banks, William Parker

A mirror element is illuminated by a light

The installation was created specifically for the new exhibition space in the Rafael Roth Gallery; photo: Ladislav Zajac/Archiv Mischa Kuball, Düsseldorf/VG Bild-Kunst, Bonn 2017

Berlin Gallery Weekend 2019: Monika Werkstatt

As part of the Berlin Gallery Weekend in April 2019, “Monika Werkstatt” will bring electronic sounds to the light installation res·o·nant.

Group photo of the musicians from “Monika Werkstatt”. Some of the woman present each one of the following objects: an axe, a sickle, a saw and a flower.

Monika Werkstatt - Ambient Werkstatt; photo: Mara von Kummer

res·o·nant LIVE

For the Berlin Art Week in September 2018, Mischa Kuball expanded his installation to the city space and Detroit musician Mike Banks performed within the installation res·o·nant.

More on res·o·nant LIVE by Mischa Kuball 
More on Soundscapes by Mike Banks

Mischa Kuball

Mischa Kuball, born 1959 in Düsseldorf, has worked since 1977 in public and institutional spaces. Using the medium of light, he explores architectural spaces and their social and political discourses. Since 2007, Mischa Kuball has been Professor for Public Art at the Academy of Media Arts Cologne (Kunsthochschule für Medien Köln), Associate Professor of Media Arts at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design (Hochschule für Gestaltung/ZKM, Karlsruhe), and since 2015 a member of the Academy of Arts and Sciences of North Rhine- Westphalia in Düsseldorf. In January 2016, he was awarded the German Prize for Light Art.

Black and white portrait of a man.

Portrait of the Artist; photo: Archive Mischa Kuball, Düsseldorf/Daniel Biskup, Wittenberg

Supported by 

Logo der innogy Stiftung für Energie und Gesellschaft.

Exhibition Information at a Glance

  • When 17 Nov 2017 to 1 Sep 2019
  • Where Libeskind Building, ground level, Rafael Roth Gallery
    See Location on Map

Links to other topics that may be of interest to you

Share, Newsletter, Feedback