Quo vadis ars?

The situation in the cultural sector has been described and discussed in numerous interviews, corona diaries, comments and reports in the past few weeks. Our annotated collection of currently 193 sources gathers voices from different sectors and media. This creates a picture of the cultural landscape in crisis, whose temporal transformation can be explored interactively via a dedicated tag cloud.


 

Das Eine-Milliarde-Euro-Baby
The One-Billion-Euro-Baby

by Dirk Peitz (05 Jun 2020)
Original source: Zeit

Dirk Peitz explores the question of how the crisis of culture in Germany can be described exactly and who is currently bearing the costs that arise in the cultural sector. The »latent lack of systemic relevance« could become a problem for the industry if the economic crisis becomes more severe or lasts longer than currently expected. While the approximately 1.7 million employees are currently an argument in favour of artists, cultural funding could be discontinued very quickly in times of tight budgets.

tag Monika Grütters Konjunkturpaket Kulturförderung Systemrelevanz
All sections Analyse

»Die Künstler haben Angst« . Wird die Kunstwelt nach Corona eine andere sein und wenn ja, wie anders?
»The artists live in fear« . Will the art world have changed after Corona?

by Vincenzo de Bellis, Heinrich Schwazer (03 Jun 2020)
Original source: Neue Südtiroler Tageszeitung

The art world will change, but we will only be able to see it in a year. The reopening is currently a real test. Even if he assumes that many smaller galleries will not survive the crisis, de Bellis is not sure whether the art market will be affected by the economic crisis.

tag Kunstwelt
Visual Arts/Design Interview

»Es gab keine Kommunikation zwischen Theater und Politik« . Öffnung von Theatern und Opernhäusern
»There was no communication between theatre and politics« . Opening ot theatres and opera houses

by Barbara Behrendt, Michael Schmitz-Aufterbeck (31 May 2020)
Original source: Deutschlandfunk

Around 30 employees at the Aachen Theater had Covid 19 in March. Even though the state government of NRW allows the theaters to reopen on May 31, a regular program will only be played in Aachen in compliance with the hygiene rules at the beginning of the new season. Then only smaller productions will be shown in front of a significantly reduced audience.
The general director Michael Schmitz-Aufterbeck is irritated in the conversation that the politicians have not previously sought a dialogue with the persons engaged in the cultural sector. He describes in great de tail the difficulty of implementing the requirements for his employees, as the rooms are particularly limited on back stage and are sometimes very narrow.

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tag Theater Oper Öffnung Hygieneregeln Kommunikation Spielplan Ulrich Khuon
Performing Arts/ Cinema Interview

Schauspielerin Stephanie Lexer über Art ist relevant . Wie wichtig ist Kunst?
Actress Stephanie Lexer on the initiative Art is relevant . How essential is art?

by Stephanie Lexer (31 May 2020)
Original source: Nachrichten München

Art and culture are constantly present in our everyday life. Whether it is the music we listen to on the radio, the series we watch in the evening or the book we read. During the Corona crisis many of the actors felt to exist under the radar. Not only were art and culture not considered to be systemically relevant, individuals also felt that their work was not appreciated. The initiative "Art is relevant" sees this as a symptom of our time, which is reinforced by the Corona crisis. The appreciation for art and culture is declining more and more in the present. This must change! At the same time, however, the industry must also become aware that it has a decisive influence on the way society thinks and acts and thus also has the responsibility to think about what our world should look like.
The actress Stephanie Lexer is co-initiator of the initiative "Art is relevant", which, however, does not want to see itself as a pure Corona initiative, but will also be committed to the interests of art and culture beyond that. One example is the critical questioning of online offerings. Often the impression arises that the work of artists of all disciplines can be regarded as a hobby that can easily be made available online. However, this is also a profession with which one has to earn a living.

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tag Systemrelevanz Wertschätzung Onlineangebote Filmproduktion Stephanie Lexer Kulturförderung
All sections Video-Interview

Kein »Zurück auf Los« für die Kultur
No »Go back to square one« for culture

by Gero Schließ (30 May 2020)
Original source: Deutsche Welle

Beside aviation, tourism and gastronomy, the pandemic has hit culture hardest. The cultural and creative industries are still waiting for the saving stimulus package that will compensate for the consequences and maintain the infrastructure. What is already foreseeable: the damage in the cultural sector is gigantic and it will have long-term effects. Part of the problem is the large number of employees who live on the edge of the subsistence level and have no reserves. This raises the fundamental cultural-political question of how to improve the situation after the crisis .

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tag Konjunkturpaket Mini-Jobs prekäre Lebenslage kulturelle Infrastruktur
All sections Kommentar

Überraschung oder Enttäuschung . Was steckt drin im Kulturpaket?
Surprise or disappointment? . What comprises the stimulus package for culture?

by Felicitas Twickel (29 May 2020)
Original source: Aspekte

In the coming week, the German federal government is to adopt an economic stimulus package for the cultural and creative industries. The hopes for support are high. Felicitas Twickel spoke to representatives of the industry who were particularly affected by the pandemic. In addition to the organizers of festivals, which will lose all income in 2020 without replacement, the freelancers in particular are affected by the crisis. If it is not possible to promote them with the announced cultural package, then the diversity of culture and music in Germany is in peril.

tag Konjunkturpaket Berufsverbot Soforthilfe Hygieneregeln Solo-Selbständige Existenzangst
All sections Beitrag

Kultur-Sofortprogramm: »Das reicht nicht aus«
Immediate Action Program for Culture: »This is not sufficient«

by Olaf Zimmermann, Jürgen Deppe (25 May 2020)
Original source: NDR Kultur

For small and medium-sized cultural institutions, the resumption of their program in compliance with the rules of hygiene entails expenditures. For this purpose, support can be applied for from the "Neustart" emergency program launched by the federal Ministers of State for Cultur, Monika Grütters. Last week, Grütters announced that the originally budgeted funds had to be doubled because of the high demand. Olaf Zimmermann welcomes this initiative of the Ministers of State for Culture and the gradual return to normality in the cultural sector, but also points out in an interview with the NRD that this program is not sufficient. On the one hand, it merely involves reallocated funds from the State Minister of Culture's budget that are currently not needed elsewhere, but on the other hand it also requires a specific culture pool to support the industry. Here he sees the federal government as having a duty. In the individual German states, the freelance artists have received support in very different ways, but this support will expire at the end of June. Here it is urgently required to think about new concepts, because the crisis is far from over for the cultural sector.

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tag Kulturförderung Monika Grütters Neustart Kultur
All sections Interview

Kritische Verteidigerin der hiesigen Demokratie . Neues Buch von Juli Zeh
Critical advocate of democracy . New book by Juli Zeh

by Andrea Gerk, Arno Orzessek (25 May 2020)
Original source: Deutschlandfunk Kultur

Juli Zeh's novel "Corpus Delicti" has already been published in 2009. So it is not a Corona novel, even though it fits perfectly into our time. In her dystopia, Zeh deals with the topic of health dictatorship by describing the seductive power of a health policy that promises everyone a long and healthy life. The bible of the system is entitled "Health as a principle of state legitimation" and establishes the METHOD, which in the novel legitimizes the primacy of the health of the individual and society in a purely logical way. In order to keep the promise of health, all possible data is collected from citizens. Zeh's criticism of people's self-subjugation in terms of health, fitness and performance optimization is unmistakable.
Since the novel is school reading, the author has now published a volume of interviews in which she answers the questions that students were asking her. The book is a self-portrait of the citizen Juli Zeh and allows for critical reflection on the Corona crisis. Zeh's statement - »It is really not easy to recognize the unreasonable in reason.« - can certainly be transferred to the present.
The critic Arno Orzessek appears to be very taken with Zeh's book, as he shares her »criticism of comprehensive preventive thinking, of reward systems for correct, i.e. conformist, systems of living«, as they can currently be observed in China. »Once you believe that life and politics are primarily about defending against any form of threat, then all other values fade away and I fear she is right about that.«
With regard to the Corona pandemic, Orzessek considers the book to be quite remarkable. He himself is very irritated by the at times »extreme authority of the virologists« in recent weeks and months. To reduce reality merely to the current case and death figures reported by the Robert Koch Institute neglects many important aspects of our everyday lives. The author and constitutional judge Juli Zeh, together with other philosophers and politicians, also pleaded in late April in »Der Spiegel« for the preservation of proportionality and made constructive suggestions as to how the rights of the individual could be preserved in the present.

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tag Corona-Roman Dystopie Gesundheitsdiktatur Grundrechte Corpus Delicti Juli Zeh Konformismus
Literature/ Text Rezension

»Die Blockbuster haben ausgedient« . Museen nach dem Shutdown
»The blockbusters had their day« . Museums after shutdown

by Hans D. Christ, Iris Dressler (23 May 2020)
Original source: Welt

In a conversation with WELT newspaper, the heads of the Württembergischer Kunstverein in Stuttgart Iris Dressler and Hans D. Christ make an argument to take advantage of the lockdown for a deeper reflection on the art world. Their text is not only a plea for a reasonable payment for the artists, but at the same time an invitation to the art institutions not to focus on a mass audience in the future, but rather to understand the houses as spaces of ideas and discourse, in which sociopolitical issues are negotiated.

tag Museen Blockbuster Honorar
Visual Arts/Design Interview

Wenn der Atem nach Freiheit dürstet . Endlich wieder im Konzert
When the breath thirsts for freedom . Finally in concert again

by Manuel Brug (20 May 2020)
Original source: Welt

For eight weeks and two days, Manuel Brug, the feuilleton contributor to the German newspaper Welt, did not attend any more cultural events. For the first live concert in Corona times he is travelling to Wiesbaden for the slimmed-down May Festival, which opens with the world-class bass and Corona rebel Günther Groissböck. Even though it was painfully experienced during the Corona era that culture is not relevant to the system and that politics is merely settling between gambling and brothel, this field report encourages the belief that the cultural industry can slowly reboot.

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tag Klassische Musik Konzert Systemrelevanz Günther Groissböck Hygieneregeln Wiesbaden
Music Erlebnisbericht

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The signet of facing arts joining the faces of STORM.

Facing arts is a non-profi project. Feel free to support it and get in touch with us!

The Team

Facing arts is a projet by STORM.

STORM is an acronym playing with the initials by Miriam Seidler & Tim Otto Roth, who are hit both by the Corona crisis. Dr. Miriam Seidler is a scholar in German literature and currently works as specialist in public relations. Dr. Tim Otto Roth is a scholar in art and science history and works as a conceptual artist and composer. He is known for his huge projects in public space, cooperations with leading scientific institutions and his immersive sound and light installations. Miriam and Tim collaborate regularly for years. With facing arts they reaslize their first common art project.
You find more informatin on both initiators on www.miriamseidler.de and www.imachination.net.

Special thanks to Paco Croket for the tag cloud programming!

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