Exhibitions

Biking in Berlin

American artist Nancy Murphy Spicer arrives in a springtime Berlin in 2010 from her adopted home country of England. She brings the usual items in her suitcase that everyone carries when visiting a new city for the first time: a city map and a city guide. Then she makes the important decision to rent a bicycle, the best of all methods to get to know a city, especially Berlin.

Her biking forays around the city are initially chosen in relation to art studios, galleries, artist-run spaces and museums. Rarely, however, does she ride to her destination directly. She takes detours with spontaneous turns here and there. She feels her way through the city, exploring the rhythms of the street, a flâneur on bike. Thanks in part to Berlin’s notably bicycle-friendly design, she moves about freely, fully aware that a brief two decades ago the Berlin Wall required Berliners to take very different routes. Murphy Spicer traverses the former borders of zones and sectors effortlessly, unselfconsciously cycling across the unified Berlin. She records her cycling routes on her city map, to orientate herself and to remember. The standard tourist map becomes her geospatial diary. Curious forms emerge, giving rise to the shapes in this place, the works that now comprise the Biking in Berlin series.