Museum Island hosts Festival of Lights from 9 to 18 October

At Museum Island (Museumsinsel) in Berlin, the Festival of Lights runs from 9 to 18 October 2026, bringing projections to the Pergamon Museum and the historic colonnades beside the Old National Gallery. The return gives visitors an evening view of buildings that combine Berlin's museum history with a live public art programme.

Festival of Lights returns to Museum Island from 9 October

The State Museums of Berlin announced that the site is participating again after a long pause. Under the festival theme Colours of Love, the colonnades on the Spree-facing side of the Old National Gallery become a screen for projections, while the Pergamon Museum receives a separate installation at its future temporary entrance.

The programme runs each evening from 7pm to 11pm between 9 and 18 October 2026, according to the State Museums. The outdoor installations are free to view. A projection lasting around three minutes uses photographs by Alexander Schippel to show the transformation of the Pergamon Museum during its restoration.

The State Museums also identify Monbijoupark, on the opposite bank of the Spree, as the best viewpoint for the projection at the Pergamon Museum. That location links the light programme to the building's current condition rather than presenting the museum as an ordinary open gallery.

Restoration gives the light programme a second subject

The Pergamon Museum is being presented from outside while its restoration continues. The projection points towards 4 June 2027, when the renovated north wing and northern central section are scheduled to reopen to the public, with the Pergamon Altar and other Hellenistic architecture among the displays planned there.

The State Museums say the north wing will also contain a newly conceived permanent display by the Museum of Islamic Art. The Old National Gallery, meanwhile, supplies the illuminated colonnades and their architectural rhythm, making the two installations a meeting of a functioning museum building and a house still under reconstruction.

UNESCO describes the site as a complex of five museums built between 1824 and 1930. Its buildings were designed in an organic relationship with their collections, a fact that makes the restoration projection especially connected to the site's heritage rather than simply to a city-wide lighting event.

From Schinkel's first museum to a night-time public display

The ensemble began with the Old Museum, designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel and built from 1824 to 1828. UNESCO lists the site as a World Heritage property because it records the development of modern museum design over more than a century.

The Festival of Lights therefore arrives during a year that also marks 200 years of Museum Island history. Its temporary images can be read against the permanent sequence of buildings, from the nineteenth-century museums to the twentieth-century Pergamon Museum and its present conservation work.

Visiting Museum Island: what travellers from Western Europe should know

• The Festival of Lights installations at the Pergamon Museum and Old National Gallery colonnades run from 9 to 18 October 2026.
• The outdoor displays are free to view from 7pm to 11pm; the Pergamon Museum remains the subject of a restoration projection rather than a normal interior visit.
• Monbijoupark, across the Spree, is the stated viewing point for the Pergamon Museum projection. Museum Island is in central Berlin, beside the Spree.
• The site is a museum complex with five buildings, and UNESCO records the buildings as dating from 1824 to 1930. The event takes place outdoors around historic architecture.
• Germany's official language is German and its currency is the euro.

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Frequently asked questions about Museum Island

When does the Festival of Lights take place at Museum Island?

The installations run from 9 to 18 October 2026, each evening from 7pm to 11pm.

What can visitors see at Museum Island during the festival?

Projections illuminate the Pergamon Museum and the historic colonnades beside the Old National Gallery. A separate projection at the Pergamon Museum presents its restoration.

Where is Museum Island and how do you get there?

Museum Island is in central Berlin beside the Spree. Monbijoupark, on the opposite bank, is the stated viewpoint for the Pergamon Museum projection.