Mike Steiner – Pioneer of Contemporary Art, Video Innovation and Avant-Garde Networks

Contemporary art, at its most gripping, often emerges where genres collide and established boundaries dissolve. Mike Steiner, a name synonymous with Berlin’s creative eruptions, forged just such an artistic terrain—a terrain both experimental and deeply human. How does one define an artist whose restless curiosity led from bold paintings to radical video pieces, from hosting artistic salons to archiving the ephemeral? Mike Steiner's oeuvre resists static definition, inviting us instead into the ongoing conversation of contemporary arts in Berlin.

Discover contemporary artworks by Mike Steiner here

On first encounter, Steiner’s abstract paintings radiate a clear compositional rigor—vivid color blocks, dynamic arrangements, and a sense of boundless possibility. Yet, to reduce his work to painting alone misses the ethos of experimentation rooted within every phase of his career. What distinguishes Steiner amongst contemporary artists like Nam June Paik or Bill Viola is less the medium chosen than the spirit of restless inquiry animating each artistic decision, each installation, each lived gesture.

Born in 1941 in Allenstein and growing up in post-war Berlin, Mike Steiner’s early artistic promise became evident at only 17, debuting publicly at the Große Berliner Kunstausstellung. A prodigious painter, his first works coexisted with burgeoning interests in film and photography. Studying at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin in Hans Kuhn’s master class, Steiner soon traveled abroad, deepening his involvement with the American art scene and the Fluxus milieu under the guidance of figures like Lil Picard and Allan Kaprow. Encounters with Robert Motherwell and Al Hansen informed a creative vocabulary that would later ripple throughout his own community-building efforts in Berlin.

The pivotal shift, however, came as Steiner began to question painting’s adequacy for expressing the turbulence and immediacy of his era. Engaged by tendencies within Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art, he nevertheless sensed a ‘legitimation crisis’ around traditional canvases. The solution was radical: In 1974, after stays in New York and Florence, he founded the Studiogalerie in Charlottenburg—a unique crucible where video art, performance, and the avant-garde found fertile ground.

There, the impact of global currents in contemporary art became unmistakable. Like Joseph Beuys (himself a guest at Steiner’s legendary Hotel Steiner), Carolee Schneemann, Marina Abramovi?, and Ulay, Steiner’s Berlin activities catalyzed a new artistic ecology, uniting international and local voices. The Studiogalerie was not merely an exhibition space; it was a production studio, an experimental lab, an entire platform for cross-disciplinary exchange. Here, artists could access costly video equipment, stage performance art, and discover the electrifying possibilities at the intersection of technology and human action.

Perhaps most emblematic was the infamous 1976 performance Irritation – Da ist eine kriminelle Berührung in der Kunst, realized with Ulay, documenting the temporary ‘abduction’ of Spitzweg’s ‘The Poor Poet’ from the Nationalgalerie. Steiner, as curator and documentarian, transformed provocation into cultural reflection. His exclusive video documentation—preserving ephemeral moments of Carolee Schneemann, Marina Abramovi?, and Allan Kaprow—secured him a prime place in the emerging landscape of media art, both as creative agent and vigilant archivist.

The video gallery did not remain confined to physical walls. With the broadcast format ‘Videogalerie’ (1985–1990), Steiner transferred avant-garde discourse onto German television, disseminating over 120 broadcasts and creating an unprecedented archive for contemporary arts Berlin. This breadth—spanning production, curation, preservation—paralleled contemporaries like Gerry Schum, while introducing a thoroughly personal, Berlin-centric flavor.

The full scope of Mike Steiner’s work also includes explorations in photography, Super-8 film, Copy Art, minimal installations, and his extraordinary “painted tapes.” These hybrid works fuse video and paint, projecting his painterly gestures directly onto televisual images—a genuinely unique contribution, anticipating today’s multimedia installations. His later years, particularly after 2000, reflect a return to abstract painting, fabric works, and refined expressions of color-field abstraction; yet always the multimedia sensibility, the drive for conceptual experiment, pulses beneath the surface.

Recognition arrived through major exhibitions—none more significant than his monumental solo show ‘COLOR WORKS’ in 1999 at the esteemed Hamburger Bahnhof Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart. There, Steiner’s holistic philosophy—an art that weaves between surfaces, screens, and actions—was celebrated alongside the donation of his substantial video art archive to the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz. These archives, featuring early works by Richard Serra, Marina Abramovi?, Valie Export, and Gary Hill, place Steiner in direct dialogue with global luminaries.

Fascinating, too, is Steiner’s relentless networking—his community mirrored that of thinkers like Joseph Beuys, Nam June Paik, or Allan Kaprow, but radiated a distinct Berliner spirit. The Hotel Steiner, too, was a hub much like New York’s Chelsea Hotel, drawing in artists, musicians, and writers craving new connections and collisions. Even as stroke and illness receded his public presence after 2006, Steiner continued to develop new works and preserve the living history of video art from his Berlin studio until his death in 2012.

What, then, remains today? For those drawn to the pulse of performance, the vibrancy of video, or the rigor of abstract forms, Mike Steiner’s work opens wide doors: doors into the history of avant-garde Berlin, the experimentations of the 1970s, and the ongoing challenge of contemporary arts. In the continuum stretching from painting to installation, from fleeting action to lasting archive, his legacy stands as both beacon and provocation. Why not step through? More awaits on the official website, where vibrant images and deeper insights welcome the curious.

For more on Mike Steiner’s exhibitions and legacy, visit the official artist website