Tuesday was a normal working day for the Bavarian Minister of State for Science and the Arts.

At least if you take the output of signs of life as a basis.

At 3.15 p.m. came the press release 034/2022 (“Starting signal for the second round of calls for the program 'kultur.digital.vermittlung': another 1.2 million euros for digital cultural mediation”), followed at 5.27 p.m. by number 035 (“Young Art and new paths: New call for the scholarship program for artists in the initial phase of their work has started").

Hannes Hintermeier

Feuilleton correspondent for Bavaria and Austria.

  • Follow I follow

Thirty-five press releases in thirty-six working days since the beginning of the year: You wouldn't want to accuse Bernd Sibler of a lack of public image.

Seventeen hours after the last sign of life, Sibler was sorted out, replaced by the party's general secretary, Markus Blume.

From Catholic Lower Bavaria to Protestant Munich, from high school teacher for German and history to four years younger graduate political scientist.

One collects spades, the other was a professional ice dancer.

The rude word of "refining"

Prime Minister Markus Söder praised Blume for the king of the bells, as they say in Bavaria: "He is one of our intellectuals, he is a university expert, has an affinity for culture, he knows digitization and research like no other." A preliminary diploma in physics definitely helps, but in what way what Blume's cultural affinity now expresses precisely has not yet penetrated that far.

He can sell political messages to suit the Prime Minister's taste.

And Sibler experiences what happened to his predecessor Ludwig Spaenle, who was abruptly kicked out by Söder at the end of 2018.

That's how they are, the rules in the politician's park?

For months, Sibler had been considered a shaky candidate in the event of a cabinet reshuffle, which the Prime Minister sold in a rather tasteless way as a "refining".

Sure, Sibler blundered.

In 2020, for example, he had himself photographed without a mask while eating sausages in the state parliament, and on his fiftieth birthday there were too many people from different households in his garden at once.

It is probably more serious that Söder never warmed to the friendly Sibler: he wants his ministers to appear as heroes of political action and at the same time not to steal the show from the leader.

About the difficulty of promoting a boss matter

Sibler didn't master this exercise.

In addition, he was attested a lack of stature and assertiveness.

He worked diligently to promote the science offensive for the boss - the "High-Tech Agenda Bavaria" launched by the Prime Minister in 2019 and backed with billions.

But as is the case with top things like Söder's "Space Valley": Sibler also had to listen to his own party that he was acting too defensively.

Blume will (have to) throw his full weight into the scales on these topics.

In the field of art, major projects such as the new concert hall in Munich's Werkviertel are stagnating, the costs of which are galloping towards the Elbphilharmonie.

Others, like the Biotopia science museum, are bobbing along (FAZ of November 1, 2021).

However, Sibler went into a tailspin during the pandemic.

Suddenly he was dealing with a cultural industry that, for once, and with good reason, agreed that it was being left behind in comparison to the rest of the world.

Although Sibler - the longer, the more often - sought contact with protagonists of this world, he was only able to offer relief recently.

Many venues had long since sunk into the depression, their directors on a confrontational course.

Did Bernd Sibler ever have the chance to sell Söder's Corona policy well if Söder himself was less and less successful?

He was also a buffer from the start, because if the culture industry has anything in common, it's reservations about the prime minister.

The self-confessed series junkie has ostentatiously let it be known that he doesn't think theater, music and art are that important.

Article 3 of the Bavarian Constitution (“Bavaria is a state governed by law, culture and welfare. It serves the common good”) also belongs to the “most beautiful office in the world”, a dictum since Strauss’s time gain weight.