Painting outdoors in the garden of Villa Schöningen: In this two-day course, participants will develop their own compositions from initial sketches—from finding a subject to bringing the work to life. You’ll work with materials of your choice, guided by artistic and compositional support.

Materials:
Pencil, graphite, charcoal, pastels, colored pencils, or painting materials of your choice
Please bring: Sketchbook/sketchpad, drawing surface (at least A3 size), drawing pens, water container, painting rags, palette

Painting outdoors in the garden of Villa Schöningen: In this two-day course, participants will develop their own compositions from initial sketches—from finding a subject to bringing the work to life. You’ll work with materials of your choice, guided by artistic and compositional support.

Materials:
Pencil, graphite, charcoal, pastels, colored pencils, or painting materials of your choice
Please bring: Sketchbook/sketchpad, drawing surface (at least A3 size), drawing pens, water container, painting rags, palette

On July 18 Villa Schlieffen will  be open to interested visitors and can be viewed as part of a free guided tour. After the withdrawal of the Soviet army in 1994, the villa remained unused until 2023. Traces of this period are still visible in the rooms today and bear witness to its eventful history.

Complementing the architectural and historical exploration, Barbara Hammer’s video installation Sanctus from the Döpfner Collection is currently on display, adding an impressive contemporary perspective to the location.

Those interested can register for a free tour by emailing info@villa-schoeningen.de and discover the fascinating past of Villa Schlieffen.

Villa Schöningen invites you to a curatorial tour of the exhibition On Paradise on 19  July at 2 pm. Assistant Curator Luis Bortt will offer insights into the exhibition’s central questions and guide visitors through the parcours spanning the interior spaces and the garden.

At the core of the exhibition lies the question of where the idea of paradise has led us over the centuries—and how it continues to shape our understanding of nature, the body, and social order today. Drawing on historical visual traditions as well as contemporary artistic positions, paradise unfolds not as a lost place, but as a projection: a site of longing, a promise, and a space of control.

The tour invites visitors to explore these tensions together and to consider paradise not as a destination, but as a cultural construction of our present.

On Sunday, July 19, 2026, Jocelyn B. Smith will perform together with Volker “Holy” Schlott in the garden of Villa Schöningen. For the fourth time, the two internationally acclaimed jazz musicians will fill the park with music, inviting visitors to listen, sing along and dance. The concert begins at 3 pm. We are looking forward to a wonderful summer afternoon and a vibrant audience in the special atmosphere of the Villa Schöningen garden.

The event is curated by the Pedales Jazz Project and takes place in cooperation with its partners.

City guide Kerstin Zarbock offers a comprehensive tour of the history of Villa Schöningen, which played a key role in German-German history. Located directly on the former inner-German border, the villa was the scene of significant events, particularly in the context of the spy exchanges at Glienicke Bridge.

The tour focuses on the significance of the house during the GDR era and sheds light on how this place became a symbol of the Cold War.

Painting outdoors in the garden of Villa Schöningen: In this two-day course, participants will develop their own compositions from initial sketches—from finding a subject to bringing the work to life. You’ll work with materials of your choice, guided by artistic and compositional support.

Materials:
Pencil, graphite, charcoal, pastels, colored pencils, or painting materials of your choice
Please bring: Sketchbook/sketchpad, drawing surface (at least A3 size), drawing pens, water container, painting rags, palette

Painting outdoors in the garden of Villa Schöningen: In this two-day course, participants will develop their own compositions from initial sketches—from finding a subject to bringing the work to life. You’ll work with materials of your choice, guided by artistic and compositional support.

Materials:
Pencil, graphite, charcoal, pastels, colored pencils, or painting materials of your choice
Please bring: Sketchbook/sketchpad, drawing surface (at least A3 size), drawing pens, water container, painting rags, palette

Villa Schlieffen is also open to curious visitors in August and can be explored as part of a free guided tour. After the Soviet army withdrew in 1994, the villa was abandoned until 2023. What remains are testimonies from times gone by. Currently, the impressive video installation “Sanctus” by Barbara Hammer from the Döpfner Collection is also on display.

Please register for a free tour at info@villa-schoeningen.de and learn about the fascinating past of this place.

City guide Kerstin Zarbock will take you on Sunday, April 26 on an impressive journey through the history of Villa Schöningen, a place of great significance in German history. Located directly on the former inner-German border, the villa was the setting for historic events, especially spy exchanges at the Glienicke Bridge.

This tour highlights the house’s role during the GDR era and its significance as a symbol of the Cold War. It is an informative and atmospheric approach to a place where world history becomes tangible.

We are pleased to invite you to the opening of our upcoming exhibition “Among the Trees” on 6 September 2026.

Presented by Passage Art at Villa Schöningen, the exhibition spans three centuries of painting, sculpture, and photography, approaching the forest not as a fixed motif but as a shared terrain continuously observed, recorded, and reimagined. Set within the historic park landscape of Potsdam, it unfolds as a dialogue between art, nature, and space. Rather than proposing a thesis, Among the Trees offers something rarer: a place for contemplation, where beauty, transformation, and the quiet presence of the forest invite us to pause and look anew.