Ben de Biel: Encore 2
About
"Encore 2" is part of Ben de Biel's "Elegantly Wasted — Ritter Butzke Berlin" photo series, whose solo exhibition takes place at Urban Spree from 14.11.2025 until 20.12.2025.
We offer a selection of limited edition photo prints of this unique series for sale.
Curated by Max Dax from over 13,000 photos taken from 2009 to 2015, the images depict the true story of one of Berlin’s most influential clubs. They capture the last nights of the initially illegal club and tell the story of its transformation.
At the invitation of its then owner, Johannes von Jena, Ben de Biel spent almost 7 years photographing at Ritter Butzke. He was there so often that the guests no longer perceived him as an outsider with a camera, but as one of their own.
De Biel, himself a former Berlin club owner in the 90s (Im Eimer, Maria am Ostbahnhof) achieved what probably no other photographer had before him: his pictures, shot behind closed doors, document not only a time and place, but also a hedonistic attitude toward life that seeks excess and, more often than not, can end in melancholic exhaustion.
A companion photobook to the exhibition has been published by Snoeck and Urban Spree and is available here.
Ben de Biel's famous documentation of the early days of the former East Berlin / MItte District in 1990 is available here under the title "Berlin Wonderland".
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"Encore 2"
50 x 70 cm / Edition of 9 = 700€ (unframed)
70 x 100 cm / Edition of 7 = 1.200€ (unframed)
100 x 140 cm / Edition of 3 = 1.900€ (unframed)
Black and white photographs are printed on Hahnemühle foto rag baryta, c-prints on Hahnemühle foto rag metallic. All photos are printed, signed and numbered by Ben de Biel, and delivered with a Certificate of Authenticity.
About the artist
Ben de Biel (born 1963) is a German, Berlin-based documentary photographer, ex-club owner, well known for his documentary photographic approach to the Berlin of the early 90s, notably « Berlin Wonderland », a book and exhibition at Urban Spree in 2014 curated by Anke Fesel and Chris Keller. The book, now in its 4th Edition, is also available at Urban Spree Bookshop, together with Elegantly Wasted — Ritter Butzke Berlin, the photobook of the current exhibition.
