An urban public project by BMW and the Guggenheim, planned to open in Berlin May 24, has been canceled due to threats of protests, according to a report from Bloomberg.
The BMW Guggenheim Lab, which made a splash on Manhattan’s Lower East Side when it debuted there last summer with panel discussions, film screenings and the like, was called off “as a consequence of threats to the project,” the Lab said in a statement. Berlin was the second stop on a six-year, nine-city tour.
Left-wing activists issued calls online to urge protesters to “derail” the project, according to the daily Tagesspiegel newspaper.
Ironically for a project intended to “address issues of contemporary urban life,” according to press materials, the Lab was derailed because opponents claimed the project would accelerate the gentrification of Berlin’s Kreuzberg district, where it was to take place, according to Bloomberg.
No new location has yet been announced, and in fact the Lab’s website still indicates it is en route to Berlin.
