Behind the Canvas – Episode 1

There’s a moment, just before a piece of art is finished, where everything still feels uncertain. The direction isn’t fixed. The meaning isn’t fully formed. And the outcome… could still go either way.

That moment is usually invisible.

We see the final work — on a wall, in a gallery, in a studio — and we assume the path was clear. That the artist knew exactly what they were doing. That the story arrived fully formed. It rarely does.

Behind the Canvas is about everything that happens before that moment. The decisions, the doubts, the false starts, the process that never quite moves in a straight line. Recorded in Berlin, this series brings you inside the working lives of artists — not to explain the work, but to understand how it comes into being. Over the next few episodes, we’ll follow different perspectives, different disciplines, and different ways of thinking about what it means to create.

We begin with our guide Volker Diehl, back in 1978…

Berlin did not begin as a market. It began as a condition—unstable, open, and largely ignored. But conditions like that don’t remain untouched. Once a place begins to generate cultural energy, it attracts attention. And attention brings structure. Influence. Capital. What emerged in Berlin did not stay local. It became part of something larger—something organised.

In the next episode, we look at how that shift begins. And how art, quietly and deliberately, becomes entangled with power.

This is Behind the Canvas.

Behind the Canvas – Episode 2

In Episode 2 of Behind the Canvas: Berlin Files, Volker Diehl reflects on the artistic landscape he encountered when he arrived in Berlin in 1978.

As the city emerged as a centre for experimentation and contemporary art, many of the structures that would shape its future were already firmly in place. American artists, galleries, collectors and institutions exerted a growing influence on the international art world, while Berlin positioned itself within an increasingly interconnected cultural landscape.

Drawing on personal experiences and observations from inside the art world, Volker explores the role of collectors, institutions, exhibitions and cultural networks in shaping artistic significance. Through stories ranging from the Zeitgeist exhibition to the Marx Collection, this episode examines how influence becomes accepted, embedded and eventually invisible.