Cultural measures

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Kulturmassätze (KM) is a group of Berlin authors and artists founded in 1997 that conducts interdisciplinary events and actions. It is also the name for the actions or projects in this group (double meaning).

Members

The group consists of the writer and director Sebastian Orlac , the musician Boris Jöns (* 1970) and the copywriter and conceptualist Thorsten Schwarz (* 1971).

Concept and methodology

One focus of the cultural activities is the observation and staging of interpersonal communication. The group's methodology is characterized by the fact that approaches and forms of work from seemingly divergent social areas overlap and interpenetrate: science, conceptual art , administration, psychotherapy , demoscopy and show business. The ironic game with the disappointed expectations of the audience and participants becomes part of a staged, ambiguous reality.

Many of the actions have a social or socially critical aspect. In doing so, however, the cultural measures dispense with an explicit social utopia or the claim to "improve" the world as a whole. Rather, the focus is on the individual shaken and damaged by the upheavals of the present, who experience a kind of ritual attention or consolation during the actions (“show of failure”, “comfort room”).

Due to the staged public in which it takes place, however, it appears to be constantly endangered or broken. As the cultural measures take over and use the context of the reality they criticize (authorities, public authorities, media), it always remains present. A characteristic of the actions is that they try to differentiate themselves from the aesthetics of the contemporary media and art landscape through visual refusal.

Stage sets, furniture and clothing of the protagonists are mostly unspectacular and uncomplicated; elements of a retro or vintage aesthetic that have characterized the Berlin subculture since the 1990s are only visible in places .

Actions

Show of failure

One of the better-known actions of the cultural measures is the project series Show of Failure , which took place for the first time on July 11, 2002 in the Club of Polish Failures in Berlin. In the form of a stage show, she presented people who had failed with their projects or ambitions.

It was characteristic that none of the speakers presented themselves as having failed, but that the "failure" always extended to sub-areas that were in part marginal. At the first show, for example, the “speaker” Michael Graessner explained to the audience how and why he had not succeeded in restoring a so-called “duo roller”. Victoria Korb spoke about a failed research project at the FU about Poland. Peter Roloff spoke about his unsuccessful attempt to “film the vowels”.

The show of failure was accompanied by music from the "Show Orchester Kapaikos" from the start. Today it consists (with a changing line-up) of: Ole Wulfers (mandolin / singing saw) Ben Rodenberg, Benjamin Staude, Boris Jöns (mandolin / vocals), Ronald Gonko (bass), Thorsten Schwarz (keyboard), and Herman Herrmann (mandolin / Singing).

Further actions

  • Troststube, Berlin, June 28, 2003
  • Anton Reiser works grant, Berlin, 2004
  • Ballast acceptance, Harriersand , August 2005
  • Munich residents let sign, Munich, May 2006
  • Substitute hour, Berlin, December 2006
  • Giessen - a city becomes a doctor, May 2007
  • KW 28, Munich, July 2007
  • Jet solutions, Berlin, November 2007
  • Kotti reports, Berlin, May 2008
  • Budget debate, Munich, September 2008

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