We are not here for fun!

Exhibition at Kunstraum Kreuzberg, Berlin

Collective and subcultural structures in Berlin in the 90s – Exhibition, Radio Feature and Talks

Many artists in Berlin in the 90s appealed to new forms of cooperation. The aim of their mainly self-organized structures was to initiate cultural productions with minimal financial outlay and to keep full control over the arising processes.

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They founded small or large clubs, galleries, record labels and magazines in net sales. The associated experiences were often shared beyond scene and genre boundaries and thus attention and appreciation often came from unexpected places.

To area enabled a completely new feeling of existence, where one could easily feel as part of a larger whole and where a manifesto was not even necessary.

Living the moment, curiosity about the otherness of the other, denial of merchantability and collective work practices seemed to be in the air. Not only the necessary spaces were generously available in the eastern part of the city, but also the right atmosphere and most of the furniture.

Some of these places were later simply demolished, others turned into playgrounds, exclusive restaurants, hotels or offices. Except for the few who were there, hardly anyone knows what happened there. It remained hidden to outsiders, what was going on behind inconspicuous doors, in cellar vaults of a second backyard or on billboard-framed green spaces.

“We are not here for fun!” combines some of these approaches and puts them into a larger urban context. A radio play based on interviews with over 30 protagonists of the time shows correlations that were characteristic of the creative subculture of the 90s. In conjunction with the exhibits, a part of a city’s history arises, that has so far hardly been described and the various talks open up a new perspective on the present.

Kunstraum Kreuzberg, June 26 – August 25 2013

A project by Paul Paulun in collaboration with Stéphane Bauer