GDR Marathon
Film Screening
Sunday June 26, 2011, 12-7pm, free
An afternoon with films produced in the German Democratic Republic (GDR) and
Eastern Germany before and after 1989
with introductions by Claus Löser, Loretta Fahrenholz and Daniel Neumann
German style snacks will be served for lunch
Goethe-Institut Wyoming Building, 5 East 3rd Street, New York 10003
SCHEDULE AT BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE
Claus Löser, Jakobine Motz
Claiming the Space - Ways of Independent Art Exhibitions in the GDR
2009, 100 min
After the expatriation of Wolf Biermann in 1976, a culture evolved in the GDR that was
separate from the official apparatuses of cultural production and dissemination. New
creative structures were formed. This subcultural approach could be found in the fields
of painting and photography as well as in literature, music and film. Galleries such as
Eigen+Art, for example, contributed to the public perception of this movement of artistic
emancipation. However, these free spaces were indebted to a large number of actors that
had were the precursors of this movement. Claiming the Space - Ways of Independent
Art Exhibitions in the GDR tells the story of this "other GDR" culture in a dialog between
present-day views and documentary recordings.
Claus Löser
Löser was born in 1962 in Karl-Marx-Stadt (today Chemnitz). From 1990-95 he
studied at the Film School in Potsdam-Babelsberg. Since 1990, he has been the
program director for the BrotfabrikKino in Berlin. In 1992 he also began working
as a freelance film critic (taz, Berliner Zeitung, film-dienst). The same year, he was
honored with the Art Award from the Berlin Academy of Art. In 1996, he became the
founding director of the collection ex.oriente.lux (Experimental Film Archive East
1976-1989) and also published the book Counter-images - cinematic subversion in
the GDR. He received a scholarship from the DEFA Foundation in 2001. In 2004,
he curated the exhibition Berlin - Moscow / Moscow - Berlin 1950 to 2000 (Gropius
Bau). He received a scholarship from 2005-2007 from the Foundation for the Study
of the SED dictatorship. In 2009, he curated the film series, Winter adé – Filmische
Vorboten der Wende (Berlinale 2009). In 2008, he published "counter-images," a
compilation DVD that was released in Germany and the USA. In 2009, he produced
the documentary Claiming the Space - Ways of Independent Art Exhibitions in the GDR
(with Jakobine Motz). He completed his doctoral thesis at the School for Film and
Television in Potsdam-Babelsberg, with a dissertation on GDR art films.
Helke Misselwitz
Winter adé
1988, 116 min
The film is about a train journey across the GDR that takes place in the last year
of its existence. On their journey from the industrial mining town of Zwickau
in Saxony, the native region of filmmaker Helke Misselwitz, to the Baltic Sea
the director meets women of different ages and social backgrounds. Some of
the meetings are arranged, while others stem from improvised situations. The
landscape and architecture of East Germany, filmed in a stark black and white
contrast, form the background. The women talk about their daily lives, their needs
and hopes. The characters of all of the woman vary greatlt and include two young
Punks, a worker from a coal mine, a Berlin economist and a 85-year-old lady who
just celebrated her 50th wedding anniversary. Their statements and observations
culminate in a diverse kaleidoscope of memories, nostalgia and disappointment that
personify the life and mood in East Germany in the year before its collapse.
Helke Misselwitz
Misselwitz was born in 1947 near Zwickau (Saxony). In 1970, she moved to East
Berlin where she worked for East German television as a presenter and assistant
director. From 1978-82 she studied film direction in Potsdam-Babelsberg. After
graduating, she did not return to television but instead began working as a freelance
writer and director. Following her studies with Heiner Carow at the Academy of
Arts of the GDR, Misselwitz produced several short documentaries including her
masterpiece, Winter adé. As a professor she teaches film directing at the Film School
in Potsdam-Babelsberg
Loretta Fahrenholz
Haust
2010, 71 min
The experimental feature film Haust follows the conflicted lives and relationships of
three former art students in East Germany. Caught up in ambivalent desires, ambitions,
and harsh economic realities, the film’ s protagonists live together in a fragile balance
that is suddenly disrupted when an unemployed friend joins their small circle. In a series
of loosely connected sequences, the film tracks the group’ s everyday rituals, shifting
intimacies, and anxieties about the direction of their lives. Haust is comprised of fictional
and documentary elements. While the storyline is imaginary, all the jobs carried out
in the film are based on the actual work experiences of the actors, all of them artists
themselves.
Loretta Fahrenholz
Fahrenholz was born in Starnberg in 1981. From 2001-07, she studied at Hochschule für
Grafik and at the Buchkunst Leipzig. She also studied from 2005-07 at the Akademie der
bildenden Künste Vienna. She attended the Whitney Independent Study Program, New
York in 2010/2011.
Shorts:
Helge Leiberg
Here comes the sun
1983, 20 min
In Here Comes the Sun abstract stimuli correspond continuously with specific
approaches to image formation. The film pulsates in a constant interchange of
concrete perception and its momentary blurring. On the one hand, fiber pen
applied on blank film, meter long continuous lines, punches, black ink blots, bright
extensions, single rings, sketched symbols, and even archaic figures. On the other
hand, object and subject-related recordings that include superimposed images of an
open-air stadium, masked actors delivering the lines of an ancient play, time-lapse
portraits of fellow artists and images of Helge Leiberg himself.
Claus Löser
Nekrolog
1986, 16mm, 6 min
Paranoia becomes a lifestyle in this somber short feature film from Karl-Marx-Stadt,
coupled with the congenial music of the British band, This Heat.
Ramona Koeppel-Welsh
Konrad, sprach die Frau Mama...
1989, 7 min
In Konrad! Sprach die Frau Mama..., Ramona Köppel-Welsh presents her childhood
images with those of other spastic children. The film documents an illegal border
crossing and, towards the end, the little boy in the film escapes an oppressive race
into the unknown.
Videoklub Das Gefummel, das kann ich nicht leiden
2004 – 11, ca. 1 – 5 Minutes
The video club, Das Gefummel, das kann ich nicht leiden, is a network of artists who produce short videos following a strict dogma. It was founded in 2004 by Axel Töpfer,
Thomas Janitzky and Daniel Neumann in Leipzig. The Clubs’ videos are made "in" the camera, without rewinding and without any editing or post-production. Offshoots of the Club were founded in Berlin, Sibiu, Catania and Basel. So far, the Video Club has produced a total of 525 short films.
with an introduction by Daniel Neumann
Daniel Neumann. Neumann is a Brooklyn-based experimental composer and audio engineer, originally from Leipzig, Germany. He holds a master's degree in media art at the Academy of Visual Art Leipzig and also studied electronic music compositon under Emanuelle Casale. Daniel currently works as a curatorial assistant for Diapason Gallery, as the curator for the series Santos is Closed, as an independent composer and sound designer, and as an audio engineer for the Electronic Music Foundation, NYCEMF and Santos Party House in New York City.
This program has been organized by Loretta Fahrenholz and Tobi Maier
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12:00
Claus Löser
Nekrolog
1986, 16mm, 6 min
Claus Löser, Jakobine Motz
Claiming the Space - Ways of Independent Art Exhibitions in the GDR
2009, 100 min
14:15 snacks
14:30
Helge Leiberg
Here comes the sun
1983, 20 min
Ramona Koeppel-Welsh
Konrad, sprach die Frau Mama...
1989, 7 min
Helke Misselwitz
Winter adé
1988, 116 min
17:15 snacks
17:30
Videoklub Das Gefummel, das kann ich nicht leiden
2004 – 11, 5 Minutes
Loretta Fahrenholz
Haust
2010, 71 min