‘Meet The Locals’ Archives
Marco Clausen: Berlin’s Urban Gardener
Madeline Maher chats to Marco Clausen, co-founder of Nomadisch Grün and the Prinzessinnengarten... Nomadisch Grün (Nomadic Green) launched Prinzessinnengärten (Princess gardens) as a pilot project in the summer of 2009 at Moritzplatz in Berlin Kreuzberg, a site which had been a wasteland for over half a century. Along with friends, fans, activists and neighbours, the group cleared away rubbish, built transportable organic vegetable plots and reaped the first fruits of their [...]
Hohenschönhausen: In Pictures
Stefanie Rothenhöfer chats to Berlin photographer Philipp Lohöfener about his work at Hohenschönhausen, Berlin's Stasi prison memorial. Philipp Lohöfener was born in 1974 in Bielefeld, Germany. He studied photography at the University of Applied Sciences in Bielefeld, Germany from 1998 till 2006. In 2010 Lohöfener won first place in the Sony World Photography Awards (Category Fine Art/Architecture 2011), and recently bagged 4th place at the Art of Photography Show, 4th Place, [...]
Dustin O’Halloran, Pianist & Composer
Wyndham Wallace shoots the breeze with Berlin-based pianist and composer Dustin O'Halloran... If you’ve seen Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette, you may already be familiar with Berlin-based Dustin O’Halloran’s exquisite solo piano music: the American contributed a number of pieces to the film’s soundtrack, including the haunting ‘Opus 23’. A member of the band Devics, who were signed to Cocteau Twin Simon Raymonde’s Bella Union Records label, he has released two albums of [...]
Artconnect Berlin
Adrian Pasen chats to Julia Mari Bernaus about the comprehensive online hub she's built for Berlin’s art community... With its heady mix of freedom of creative expression, liberalism and affordable living, it’s little wonder that Berlin continues to serve as the unofficial hub for peripatetic creatives from all corners of the globe.It makes for an incalculably large talent pool, all looking for new outlets, new inspiration and new collaborative opportunities. But the sheer number and [...]
Thomas Pletzinger: Funeral For A Dog
Where Adam Butler conducts two separate interviews with Thomas Pletzinger and Ross Benjamin, author and translator of Funeral for a Dog, and presents them simultaneously... Are you sure this is going to work? You have to click on that little camera symbol. I talked to Thomas Pletzinger (the author) and Ross Benjamin (the translator) separately. I met Ross first, in a restaurant next to Wannsee S-Bahnhof that, as far as I could tell, was entirely staffed by Russians. It was raining; I [...]
Stephen Barber: Walls Of Berlin
Stephen Barber is a Professor at Kingston University's and a writer on urban culture, experiment in film and Japanese culture. He has been writing since 1990 and has published twenty books (sixteen non-fiction books and four novels), many of them translated into other languages. He has received many awards and prizes for his books, from bodies such as the Rockefeller Foundation (Bellagio Program), Ford Foundation, DAAD, Japan Foundation and Henkel Foundation, He is currently engaged in a [...]
Dong Xuang Center
Marian Ryan visits Lichtenberg's Dong Xuang Center and takes a closer look at Berlin's Vietnamese community... To any casual visitor, it’s obvious: Berlin, in many ways, is a mess. Despite twenty years of rebuilding and gentrification, of whitewash and polish, you’ll find prairie-size empty tracts just west of shiny new Potsdamer Platz and grimy, windowless buildings in Prenzlauer Berg. Decay and regeneration, subtle processes in most places, here are on brazen display. This [...]
Ewan Pearson, Clubland Maestro
Wyndham Wallace chats to Berlin-based DJ, producer, writer and clubland luminary Ewan Pearson... Very much the renaissance man, English born Ewan Pearson has earned a reputation as one of the best contemporary DJs, producers and musicians around. Known to many for his remixes of Goldfrapp, The Chemical Brothers, Feist and Franz Ferdinand, he’s not afraid of venturing beyond the electronic music scene, and has worked as a producer for The Rapture, Gwen Stefani, M83, Delphic and [...]
Naked in Berlin
Siobhán Dowling disrobes in Berlin and becomes one of the locals... It’s ladies day at the sauna in my local gym in East Berlin and I’m almost mesmerized by the amount of flesh on show. I’ve found myself sharing the small wooden enclosure with three elderly East German ladies all of whom are blessed with ham-like thighs and the most impressively enormous pendulous breasts. The women are nattering away as I slink in and soon draw me into their conversation. They tell me about [...]
The Three Sisters
Molly Hannon checks out a new Kreuzberg dining spot that fuses rock & roll with traditional cuisine and local produce... “Primitive Rock 'n’ Roll and Fine food” is the Three Sisters’ motto. However, upon entering the restaurant, one senses there is nothing primitive about this place. It looks more like an old style ballroom reminiscent of the American South, with its high lofty ceilings, whitewashed walls, long oak bar, and a small stage with a grand piano. (This Southern [...]
