Entertainment Arts Committee
The Committee for Entertainment Art of the German Democratic Republic was founded in 1973 and was subordinate to the Council of Ministers of the GDR . The institution, originally intended as an advisory body for the Ministry of Culture, increasingly assumed the function of an association of entertainers, since the artists' demand for the creation of such an association remained unfulfilled.
task
The task of the committee was to provide uniform guidance and coordination of programs and forms of performance in the field of entertainment . It was an instrument to enforce the cultural policy of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany and the political-ideological control of the artists in the GDR. Increasingly, especially after 1984, the committee took on the task of representing the interests of entertainers in the GDR.
Characteristic
Members of the committee were representatives of mass organizations , the media, the concert and guest performance directorates , the GDR artist agency and the association for composers and musicologists. At the same time a general directorate was set up at the committee to watch over the political and ideological development of the entertainment arts. The general management had authority over the concert and guest performance directorates in the districts of the GDR. The general management, which was structurally independent from the committee, assumed the function of the secretariat for the committee.
In addition to the actual monitoring function, the committee contributed significantly to the independent development of pop and rock music in the GDR and the entertainment arts as a whole through funding agreements, mentoring or the mediation of production opportunities at Amiga and the GDR radio .
In 1984 it was restructured into a voluntary social body. The sections ( jazz , rock music , chanson , songwriters, interpreters, word art, discos, orchestra conductors and artistry ) emerged from the working groups. The chairmen of the sections and representatives of the mass organizations and the General Management (Presidium) were assigned to the President. The presidents were Siegfried Wagner (1973–1984) and Gisela Steineckert (1984–1990). General directors were Peter Czerny (1973–1982), Dieter Gluschke (1982–1988) and Reinhard Heinemann (1988–1990). Numerous well-known GDR artists were volunteers on the committee, for example Frank Schöbel and Gisela Oechelhaeuser as vice-presidents, Conny Bauer as chairman of the jazz section or Toni Krahl as chairman of the rock section.
On December 18, 1989, the committee disbanded. On January 1, 1990, the general management was transformed into the newly founded state agency "ComConcert", which ceased its business activities on February 28, 1990.
literature
- Götz Hintze: Rock Lexicon of the GDR . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 1999, ISBN 3-89602-303-9 .