BERLIN – Museums are rare. As one of the few establishments that represent both the past and the future, their colossal tenure begs to be explored, more so than most other places in Berlin. For a couple of decades since East and West Germany shook hands and the walls came down in 1989, state-funded arts organizations have reaffirmed their progressive vision by nodding to their history: how can we not lay the foundations for an equitable tomorrow by judging our past deeds. ? Bureaucrats and politicians were eager to rebrand the metropolis as a cultural capital. Doing so meant pouring large sums of state funds into museums, festivals and galleries, such as the Berlinale festivals, the House of World Cultures, the KW Institute for Contemporary Art, the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum, the New Society for Visual Arts, and more. Investing in cultural capital promised returns in economic income. These are just a few notable examples of progressive spaces putting taxpayer dollars to good use.
This it seems like a calculated kid pro quo, an exchange that pleases civil servants and cultural workers. But then Germany presented itself as a patron of the arts to the public and private institutions it funded, while at the same time demolishing shared cultural spaces. Creativity has been privatized. Toilets and squatters around the village were demolished as the police charged. First it was Mainzerstraße in 1990. Then Kreuzigerstraße, Rosenthalerstraße, Liebigstraße and Yorckstraße. All were washed away with tear gas and quite a bit of police brutality, as well as political interest in changing the demography of the suburbs and removing the anarchist movements that created an aesthetic and existence that was later absorbed and absorbed into financial speculation; Places of creative coexistence were becoming fodder for real estate.
Since then, the issue has declined, and it is impossible to inspect art and culture in the city without such interference. Berlin bars with political events are constantly monitored. Muslim cultural centers are forced to close, as is the case in the city’s predominantly migrant neighborhoods. The pro-Palestinian vigils are repealed. Talk about a “culture of memory”, right? Groups in Berlin cannot create and interview on terms that suit their needs. Indeed, there is a name for such a condition that suppresses all attempts to create alternative forms of production and expression: monopoly.
Many Berliners are turning away from our tax-funded cultural institutions. As hard as it is for someone like me to admit, financial hardship and the dwindling amount of unclaimed space has forced us to become much more. more conservative than previous generations. With no heat and no political imagination, we no longer envision breaking into abandoned homes and making the world work again. The best we could aspire to is to work as a civil servant in a museum.
The demands of freedom without resources for its collective realization define Berlin’s museums, galleries and other art institutions. While 90s and early art communes such as the legendary Kunsthaus Tacheles once housed, presented and provided amenities for dozens of artists from all corners of the earth, its current successor, Fotografiska Berlin, only shows three exhibitions at a time. however, he has the courage to organize panel discussions about inclusivity in the arts. Entering Fotografiska Berlin, its walls remain encrusted with the artworks of its former neighbors. Their paintings and interventions are on display in their entirety: taxidermied moments of a bygone fauna staged like trophies. As a hunter would in a cabin. This is a corrupt apparatus. So let’s take it a step further. We should assume that the few who work in and benefit from private institutions can truly represent the needs of the 99%. that is: the economy of secretion. But the faith that decolonization and diversification in the highlands promise to produce cultural growth and political emancipation is not common. Who are the artists and thinkers involved in such a farce?
The government’s selective investment in the arts in Germany has created a sad joke. State-funded “radicals”. Cultural workers who want to have their cake and eat it too. They give Germany a beating by pampering them in the bourgeois way of life. Perhaps such a partnership provided mutual benefits. But since October 7 and the ongoing siege of Gaza, the link between the German cultural sector and those it supports has gone blank. The exhibitions of Palestinian artists and their supporters are said to be canceled once a week. Events with Jewish participants who challenge the German state apparatus are being canceled by government-funded organizations alleged anti-Semitism. In one extreme case, Berlin’s Senate of Culture pushed through and overturned a clause that made public funding for artistic projects conditional on Israel’s recognition. Whatever one may think of the bureaucratization of historical trauma and geopolitical reparations, most of us can agree that it is a blind duty to anyone. the social structure, from a government to an art organization, is antithetical to the very notion of artistic practice, critical thinking, and the avant-garde that Berlin’s political forces want to capitalize on. Although this alarming condition was overturned in January thanks to a sustained demonstration by cultural workers, anti-Palestinian resentment and anti-Semitism are still a major problem in Germany’s cultural sector.
Unfortunately, I have learned this from personal experience. As a former editor of an occasional state-funded arts magazine based in Berlin, a colleague and I were called by municipal representatives last July over my decision to publish an interview with a non-violent Palestinian resistance fighter. It happened a month before the first bullet was fired in the current siege, German bureaucrats at the hearing described my decision as an Israeli Jew to be anti-Semitic and promote hatred of Jews. Our meeting ended with an unspoken suggestion: avoid posting about such topics in the future, or be prepared to say goodbye to your funding.
As the saying goes, politicians always have two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and a real reason. The so-called good reason for the growing political interventions in art is that the German government claims to be targeting Palestinian migrants, Muslims, Arabs and human rights defenders in order to combat the rise of anti-Semitism. This notion is known as imported anti-Semitism in Germany. Now, could it be that some migrants have anti-Semitic beliefs about Jews? Absolutely – just as Israelis in Germany can harbor resentment and hatred against Muslims. However, there is no public debate about imported Islamophobia. But maybe a real reason in fact, these political interventions are economic. Recessions and expenses affect cultural institutions. However, since the state cannot declare that it does not have the resources to invest in art and culture, moralizing and policing have taken it as a distraction. We should also note that the silencing of Palestinian and Jewish leaders in Berlin is taking place under the watch of a conservative coalition, possibly as a means of attracting swing voters from the neo-fascist Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany). the party
Make no mistake: Government investment in cultural establishments is significant and effective in most cases. But it can stifle rather than encourage innovation. Would art forms such as graffiti, hip hop and techno arise because global cultural phenomena were protected by the state or the interests of private companies responsible for their development, or would their emergence be conditioned by their own interests? unlikely Creative output requires unlimited trial and error to flourish; These conditions of spontaneous behavior, removed from economic and political speculation, once made Berlin attractive. If the city wants to return to this, creating its own art requires a return to anarchism.
