The loss of a third of the population, an unemployment rate of twenty percent and a youth turning their backs on this place of structural change.
These are the characteristics of a city that, decades after reunification, suffered from the worst possible reputation – Bitterfeld.
The artist Sven Johne is committed to the first edition of the art festival “Osten.
New Bitterfeld Paths" in the large hall of the Kulturpalast, which is located right next to the famous chemical park, dealt with the scars of the transformation.
Kevin Hanschke
volunteer.
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He has put together a photo archive that illuminates the light and dark sides of the turnaround and depicts the people of the industrial strongholds at their work, in their everyday life and in their free time.
The images projected onto the palace's Iron Curtain are accompanied by a child's voice telling of visits to the grandparents.
“I like being there.
It's an uncluttered place.
There are a few industrial plants and houses.
What's striking is how empty it is here."
In addition, a mosaic of life after the Wall came down in Bitterfeld and Wolfen unfolded: the first supermarkets, celebrations of traditional costume associations, the closure of factories, protests, bowling clubs, but also the living rooms of workers.
Authentic voices of the working society
The visual worlds make it clear what the art festival, which will be held in the Kulturpalast until July 17, is all about: artistically grasping the East, conveying an attitude to life and using art to find approaches to overcoming social challenges.
Industrial culture and contemporary art should come together, which also becomes clear in the sound installation "Shifts" by the artists Franziska Klose and Lorenz Hoffmann.
To do this, they asked people about their jobs and distributed the recordings to the industrial plants, factories and logistics centers.
They are authentic voices of the working society, in a city where every job has long been feared.
If you look at the mere social statistics, you will be amazed at the numbers that illustrate the loss of social identity.
But cultural life in the chemical region of Bitterfeld, Wolfen and Leuna is flourishing again.
New urban development and architectural projects are planned everywhere and one of the important architectural landmarks of the city is to be revived;
the Kulturpalast from the early 1950s, in which the cultural policy of the early GDR was outlined with the Bitterfelder Weg.
At that time, the credo of Walter Ulbricht's state leadership was that "workers should grab their brushes and pencils".
Literature and art should deal with the reality in the companies.
This is one of the reasons why a circular culture developed in Bitterfeld, which also influenced contemporary artists.
Many of her interventions are designed to engage with the festival audience.
Henrike Naumann, who is known for her room installations made of historical furniture, with which she reflects on the social problems of the East, offers painting circles in which she conveys her art practice to laypeople.
The thesis of the festival curators is that the transformation process of East Germany can be read in the industrial city.
That is why there are also architectural-theoretical tours, such as in the Wolfen-Nord prefabricated building area, which once housed the industrial workers of the world-famous film industry.
Germany's first color film was produced in Wolfen, and in the 1980s the new development district developed into one of the most popular quarters in what was then a growing city.