Every two years there is a special weekend in Rehna: In 2025, on July 19 and 20, the monastery festival will take place for the 14th time.
It is traditionally an atmospheric festival that presents handicrafts, music, dance and art in the historical ambience of the monastery grounds and focuses on historical and current events.
In the church square, artisans offer their products and sometimes demonstrate their craft. The quality of handicrafts and the natural materials continue to inspire, individually crafted products are things for life, sustainable and wonderful gifts. You can see and buy blacksmithing and woodwork, ceramics, glass, textiles, felted items, natural cosmetics and macramé work.
In Kinderland, children can try out historical games, old crafts and creative activities such as origami, manga drawing, felting and mosaic making. Children can learn to juggle with the jugglers Max & Moritz, shape clay bricks, listen to fairy tales from all over the world and watch the dancers from the Rehna Dance School interpret the "Four Seasons".
The themes of the monastery festival, which also offers cultural diversity and insights into other cultures as well as the opportunity to join in, move between past and present.
Traditionally, the jugglers open the monastery festival and entertain the audience for two days with their tricks and acrobatics. The band Satolstelamenderfanz also plays several times on both days, sometimes folk songs from different countries, sometimes a capella songs, sometimes powerful dance music. The four musicians follow the age-old tradition of traveling minstrels. The instruments they play are also historical: Mongolian oboe, Celtic moon bass, bhodran, taragota, but also bagpipes, gaitas, shawms, davul, nyckelharpa and guitar zister.
The Sistanagila ensemble will be performing in the church on Saturday afternoon. The Israeli and Iranian musicians, who live in Berlin, seek dialog with their music, they listen to each other and make music together. They play folkloric and religious melodies from klezmer, Sephardic and traditional Persian music as well as modern and classical compositions. The musicians rearrange melodies and motifs, which ultimately merge with influences from flamenco and jazz to create new music and build a bridge between two worlds.
In addition to the musical journey into other cultures, the art project "Good morning, world" will present contemporary art from all over the world. The artist Herbert Hundrich invited artists from all over the world to share their current work. Photographs from all continents followed, which can now be seen in the art rooms of the monastery. The project is sponsored by the Nordkirche. The Rehna parishes invite you to ecumenical church services and prayers of the hour. The Rehna schoolchildren, on the other hand, will be exploring the countries of the world during a project week and will be exhibiting their posters in the courtroom.
Author Marica Brodrozic talks about a first and second home. She will be reading from her book "Herzflorett" on Saturday afternoon. The multi-award-winning author, who came to Germany from Croatia at the age of ten, is characterized by bilingualism, just as her first homeland, the former Yugoslavia, was characterized by the coexistence of different languages, cultures and identities.
Further musical experiences will be the organ concert by Christoph D. Minke, the chanson evening by Soleil vert and, at the end on Sunday, the Latin American music of the band Conexión. While short films show the humor and mindset of Scandinavian filmmakers, you can immerse yourself in Japanese culture through a bonsai exhibition.
In case of bad weather, the events will take place indoors; changes will be announced on site.
Saturday: Admission from 11 a.m.
Sunday: Admission from 10 a.m.
Admission prices:
Day ticket
€10.00 regular | €8.00 reduced
Weekend ticket: €15.00 regular | €12.00 reduced
Children and young people up to and including the age of 18 are admitted free of charge.
