Sung Tieu Recreates Berlin Immigrant Housing at Venice
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- Sung Tieu built a full‑scale replica of the Gehrenseestrasse complex's façade for the German pavilion at the Venice Biennale, using three million mosaic stones crafted in Ravenna.
- Sung Tieu worked with the late artist Henrike Naumann on the pavilion's design before Naumann's death in February at age 41.
- Sung Tieu grew up in the Gehrenseestrasse housing estate in Berlin, where she shared a single 2‑by‑90 cm bed with her mother for three years and recalled cooking bánh bao dumplings on camping stoves.
- Sung Tieu has a background in acting, having played the character Ching in the German TV series "Turkish for Beginners."
- Sung Tieu frames the abandoned Gehrenseestrasse complex as a monument to the forgotten Vertragsarbeiter generation of immigrant workers who built East Germany's economy.
Why it matters: The replica will draw global visitors to the German pavilion, giving visibility to the overlooked Vertragsarbeiter workers and prompting Berlin to preserve its immigrant heritage, while the art world gains a powerful, historically rooted installation.
