The Infinite Now

Berlin Atonal x Unsound present The Infinite Now
 The Infinite Now is the first formal collaboration between Berlin Atonal and Unsound: a singular 30-hour continuous musical program at Kraftwerk Berlin, preceded by three stand-alone prelude concerts across the week. This is the main Berlin Atonal event for 2026. The Infinite Now runs continuously from 7pm on Saturday 16 May until midnight on Sunday 17 May. Over thirty hours, the programme moves through distinct phases, dusk, night, dawn, day and a second dusk, with the architecture of Kraftwerk opening and closing around the audience as the hours pass. Sleep is treated here as a condition of listening rather than an interruption of it, and many works have been programmed in the knowledge that much of the audience will be horizontal and drifting. Saturday evening opens at dusk with a run of solo performances, Shane Parish's acoustic guitar readings of Autechre, the granular ambient electronics of 7038634357, Joanne Robertson alone with her voice and guitar, and by 22:00 the German unveiling of Caterina Barbieri's remarkable new work for electronics, vocal ensemble and brass with light and scenic design from MFO and Ruben Spini. Brìghde Chaimbeul carries the programme on amplified smallpipes to midnight, where the Italian theatre director Romeo Castellucci and his long-time collaborator, the composer Scott Gibbons present the first of two performances of their new work To Carthage then I came on the ground floor. Upstairs, Paul Jebanasam performs material from mātr. The deep night belongs first to Lois Patiño and Xabier Erkizia, whose two-hour cinematic journey guides a recumbent mass audience through a collective dream sequence, and then to Kali Malone, playing an extraordinary set composed almost entirely of long-form installation works otherwise heard only inside gallery and museum commissions, timed to unfold through the quietest hours of the night. The set bleeds into dawn and into Adam Wiltzie's A Tired Reworking of Stars of the Lid For the Sleep Deprived, a three-hour revisiting of the Stars of the Lid catalogue assembled expressly for an audience waking into the second day and presented here for the first time. Late morning brings Eiko Ishibashi and Jim O'Rourke's Kotoński Reworked, a rare presentation of their reworking of the Polish electronic pioneer in the form of an installation, followed by the second performance of To Carthage then I came. Sunday afternoon passes through guitarist Raphael Rogiński's solo interpretation of John Coltrane, the Słyż and Rożynek commission And The Sun Stood Still for brass and electronics – performed with the tuba trio Microtub, Marta Salogni's tape-machine performance, and then the massive three-hour presence of Marginal Consort, the cult Japanese collective improvisation group convening for one of their rare appearances outside Japan. Sunday evening brings Joy Guidry on bassoon and electronics, two distinct sets from Keiji Haino, one for voice and one for guitar and electronics, Darren Cunningham's new Actress live show, and the four-way 2k88, Lauren Duffus, Rainy Miller and Bianca Scout collaboration born from an Unsound residency in Gdynia. Terrence Dixon closes the thirty hours at 23:00 with the world premiere of A Cosmic Display of Beauty, a new work by one of Detroit techno's most uncompromising figures. Throughout the full span, four environmental works by Brennan Wojtyla, Alex Reynolds and Robert M Ochshorn, Fabien Giraud and Anne Stern, and Marcel Weber remain installed across the building, available to be discovered, returned to, or inhabited at length. In the lead up to The Infinite Now, Berlin Atonal and Unsound host 3 stand-alone prelude concerts in the Kraftwerk main space. Prelude 1 sees Oneohtrix Point Never perform the Tranquilizer live show with Freeka Tet, with an opening set from Piotr Kurek. Prelude 2 invites Hania Rani's alter-ego Chilling Bambino with support from Torus. Prelude 3 invites Sinfonietta Cracovia to play Gavin Bryars' The Sinking of the Titanic and Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet, alongside a new work by Aleksandra Słyż. Tickets for the 30-hour continuous programme on 16 and 17 May are available in three types. The 30-Hour Pass + Bed is the fullest form of attendance, granting unlimited access across the full span from 19:00 on Saturday 16 May to midnight on Sunday 17 May, together with a reserved camp bed in the Kraftwerk's upper hall, chosen on arrival. At well under the price of a night in a Berlin hotel, the pass offers an unusually direct proposition: a bed, a programme, and a building to inhabit for a weekend. The Saturday Entry Ticket admits entry until 23:59 on Saturday 16 May. The Sunday Entry Ticket admits from 12:00 on Sunday 17 May. Otherwise these tickets provide full access to the program except for the reservation of a camp bed. Tickets for the three Prelude concerts on 10, 12 and 14 May are sold separately. Holders of a 30-Hour Pass + Bed receive €10 off each Prelude: within one week of purchase, a personalised link is sent by email, and the discount can be applied to one, two, or all three concerts. For more information, write to [email protected].