--- title: "Yangkun Shi & Charlotte Ming: Currents" date: 2025-07-16 last_modified: 2026-05-04T08:26:53+02:00 generated_at: 2026-06-08T22:04:36Z url: "https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/en/story/yangkun-shi-charlotte-ming-currents" description: "Yangkun Shi & Charlotte Ming: Currents | Dekoloniale Residents 2024" image: "https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/763A3105-min-min.jpg" language: "en-US" --- # Yangkun Shi & Charlotte Ming: Currents ![Drei Gemälde mit blauem Grund im Altarraum](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/763A3105-min-min-300x200.jpg) *In the course of the Dekoloniale Artist Residency 2024 “Colonial Ghosts – Resistant Spirits: Church, Colonialism and beyond” at the exhibition [Dekoloniale – what remains?!](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/en/exhibition/dekoloniale-what-remains), five selected guest artists present their works at the Museum Nikolakirche and also work with and in the public space of Berlin.* ## Yangkun Shi & Charlotte Ming: Currents Charlotte Ming and Yangkun Shi’s collaborative and interdisciplinary work brings to light the obscured history of German colonialism in China combining photography, video, writing, archival imagery, and the explorations of foodways. Their work traces the legacies of this history across urban landscapes from Qingdao to Berlin, exposing this forgotten past and its underlying violence. Intertwining personal and historical narratives, they challenge and reframe the colonial gaze to re-center contemporary migration experiences. ## The art works The installations connect Qingdao and Berlin through the themes of ocean, water, and sand, revealing their colonial pasts and present in urban landscapes. ### Mirage The screenprint technique in Prussian blue reveals a ghostly image of the Iltis warship on the sea of Qingdao – an echo of its role in the Boxer Rebellion and its sinking during the Siege of Tsingtao in WWI. ![](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/763A3111-min-min-300x200.jpg) ![](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/763A3120-min-min-200x300.jpg) ### Between the Waves The video installation examines the transformation of Qingdao into a beach resort for Europeans within a racially segregated colony. By interweaving personal memories and migration experiences, the work challenges the dominant colonial narrative, largely shaped by German perspectives. It seeks to re-center the Chinese experiences, restoring a sense of agency and healing. ## Greetings from Kiautschou Street This artwork is a series of recreated postcards that seek to challenge the colonial gaze in historical postcards from the German colonial era. ![Fotos in einer Vitrine voller Sand](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/763A3129-min-min-300x200.jpg) ![Eine Besucherin beugt sich über eine oben offene Vitrine, die gefüllt ist mit Sand und einzelnen Postkarten](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/2024_11_13_PKWasBleibt-098-300x200.jpg) ![Nahaufnahme der Vitrine mit Sand mit Fokus auf einer Postkarte, auf der eine Laterne zu sehen ist](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/2024_11_13_PKWasBleibt-099-300x200.jpg) Inspired by colonial-era postcards sent home by colonists with “greetings” from colonized lands, Charlotte Ming sends home her own postcards from Berlin streets that bear colonial names. Featuring night-time photographs of these streets captured by Yangkun Shi, the series aims to invert the colonial gaze and confront the remnants of colonialism through a migrant perspective. A participatory intervention was staged at Pekinger Platz. ##### Yangkun Shi & Charlotte Ming **Yangkun Shi** is a Shanghai-based photographer and visual artist whose work visualizes hidden histories and underlying traumas and violence. His work has been exhibited at institutions including the Peabody Essex Museum and the Shanghai Center of Photography. **Charlotte Ming** is a Berlin-based journalist, writer, and artist visual editor exploring the themes of culture, history, and migration. Bridging the historical with the personal, her long-term research examines the cultures of memory surrounding the German colonial past in China, particularly in her hometown Qingdao. ## Find out more - [ ![](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/Dekoloniale_Berlin_Residents-2-300x214.png)](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/en/dekoloniale-berlin-residents) - [ ![](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/keyvisual_300dpi19-296x300.jpg)](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/en/exhibition/dekoloniale-what-remains) ## Info & Service ##### Opening Hours daily | 10 am – 6 pm (also on public holidays) **Differing opening hours:** Sun | 21.06. | 10 a.m. – 10 p.m. (Museum Festival / Fête de la Musique) Sat | 29.08. | 10 a.m. – 2 a.m. (Long Night of Museums) Mon | 31.08. | Closed Mon | 14.09. – 01.10. | Closed (Change of exhibition) Thu | 24.12. | Closed (Christmas Eve) Fri & Sat | 25. + 26.12. | 12 p.m. – 6 p.m. (First & Second Christmas Day) Thu | 31.12. | Closed (New Year’s Eve) Fri | 01.01. 2027 | 12 p.m. – 6 p.m. (New Year’s Day) The [visitor rules](https://staging.stadtmuseum.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/besuchsordnung-stadtmuseum-berln.pdf) of the Stiftung Stadtmuseum Berlin apply. ##### Directions Nikolaikirchplatz 10178 Berlin [ Google Maps](https://maps.google.de/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=de&geocode=&q=Nikolaikirche%2C%20Nikolaikirchplatz%2C%20Berlin&aq=2&oq=Nikol&sll=52.514027%2C13.415251&sspn=0.015096%2C0.030513&vpsrc=0&ie=UTF8&hq=Nikolaikirche%2C%20Nikolaikirchplatz%2C%20Berlin&ll=52.517527%2C13.40744&spn=0.030189%2C0.061026&t=m&z=14&iwloc=A&cid=6093985458874356584) [ Bus & Train](https://www.bvg.de/en/connections/connection-search) ##### Contact Infoline +49 30 24 002-162 Mo – Fri | 10 a.m. – 6 p.m. [Write E-Mail](mailto:info@stadtmuseum.de) ## Tickets ##### Admission **Combi-Ticket** 15 euros Valid for our three museums in the Nikolaiviertel (Museum Nikolaikirche, Museum Ephraim-Palais, Museum Knoblauchhaus) on two consecutive days (please note opening hours) **Single Ticket** 7 euros Day ticket for the Museum Nikolaikirche **Free admission With proof of reduction** for children and adolescents under 18 years of age, students, trainees, FSJ/FÖJ/BFD volunteers, Berlin Ticket S holders, severely disabled persons (at least 50% GdB) and their Personal Assistant, refugees (with a valid work or residence permit/eAT and a Ukrainian passport or valid residence permit from Ukraine), recipients of transfer payments (Bürgergeld, ALG I), holders of the Berlin-Brandenburg Ehrenamtskarte, holders of the Super-Ferienpass / Berliner Familienpass, ICOM members, members of Deutscher Museumsbund, Verein der Freunde und Förderer des Stadtmuseums Berlin e. 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