Kunsthaus Tacheles
Encyclopedia
The Kunsthaus Tacheles (Art House Tacheles), is an art center in Berlin
, a large (9000 square meter) building on Oranienburger Straße in the district known as Mitte
. Huge, colorful graffiti-style murals are painted on the exterior walls, and modern art sculptures are featured inside. The building houses an artists collective which is threatened with eviction.
Originally called "Friedrichsstadtpassagen", it was built as a department store in the Jewish quarter (Scheunenviertel
) of Berlin, next to the synagogue
. After serving as a Nazi prison for a short while, it was later partially demolished. After the Berlin Wall
had come down, it was taken over by artists, who called it Tacheles, Yiddish for "straight talking." The building contained ateliers and workshops, a nightclub, and a cinema.
s.
The five-story building was made of reinforced concrete
with a colossal ribbed dome. The façade was built to be dependent upon this concrete frame. There were several small businesses on both sides of the large covered passage. The building is typically treated as an example of early Modern architecture but exhibits aspects of both Classic
and Gothic
styles. The complex also housed its own pneumatic tube
system for sending mail and materials within the building.
A group of individual shareholders hoped to establish a market advantage by capitalizing on a common location. The concept meant that stores would not be strictly separated from one another, but would instead be allowed to overlap. This was enabled by the existence of a central point-of-sale terminal, where all customers would pay for their goods. But a mere 6 months after its opening the passage had to file for bankruptcy in August 1908. The complex was then rented by Wolf Wertheim, who in 1909 opened a new department store, which operated until 1914. The building was auctioned off shortly before World War I
.
It is unclear how the building was used between 1914 and 1924. In 1924, among other additions to the building, a deep cellar was built. This cellar still exists today and is also known as the Tresorraum. The height of the ceiling in the passage was lowered to that of the stores, which changed the appearance of the building completely.
(General Electric Company). It was renamed Haus der Technik by the proprietor, the Berliner Commerz- und Privatbank. The AEG used the space to display products and advise customers. The former AEG show room, located at Luisenstraße 35, had been destroyed by a fire on September 15, 1927. The new space covered over 113,000 sq ft (10,500 sq. meters) and used 20 large display cases. One of the first German television transmissions took place here during the 1930s.
In 1943 the skylights were closed and the corresponding ridge turrets removed, so that French
war prisoners could be held in the attic. During the Battle of Berlin
the second cellar was flooded by the Nazis and remains underwater today. The building was heavily damaged during World War II
, though a large portion of it survived intact.
(FDGB) and deteriorated over the course of the next several years. Various retailers and craft businesses temporarily moved into the ruins, especially on the Friedrichstraße side. The German Travel Agency used the repaired passage section and several floors above ground. Among others, there was an artists' school, a technical school for foreign trade and economics, and office spaces for RTF (Rundfunk- und Fernmelde-Technik), a company dealing with radio and transmission technology. The cellar was used by the National People's Army
.
The movie theater Camera was located in the Friedrichstraße gateway area, but was forced to leave in 1958 due to the worsening condition of the building. The presentation hall was dismantled, but was later reopened under the name OTL (Oranienburger Tor Lichtspiele). During the reconstruction work the facade was partially changed and a lobby area was built to house cash registers and checkout aisles. The roof was also rebuilt. This created the current entryway. The movie theater is still used today as a theater area, and after further reconstruction in 1972, it was renamed Camera.
Though having suffered only moderate damage during the second World War, the building was slated to be demolished as a result of two engineering opinions from 1969 and 1977; it had not once been renovated, despite relatively continuous and intensive use. A new street was planned on the site and would have created a shortcut between Oranienburger Straße and Friedrichstraße.
The demolition
began in 1980. The dome was torn down and the movie theater closed. The remaining portions of the building were scheduled to be demolished in April 1990.
The artists' initiative had a new engineering survey done to evaluate the building's structural integrity. The study found that the building was in surprisingly good shape, and it was named a historic landmark shortly thereafter. Its status was officially recognized after a second survey done in February 1992.
In the beginning the centre was run by well-known curator Jochen Sandig who expanded the building considerably. In its early days, Tacheles provided both housing and work space for its artist residents. In 1991, the associated housing burnt down, and there was considerable suspicion that the fire was started deliberately in order to pave the way for a new art centre. Among the early exhibitors were artist Mark Divo
, sculptors the Mutoid Waste Company
, musicians Spiral Tribe
, theatre group DNTT, performance artist Lennie Lee
, dancer/ choreographer Sasha Waltz
, Ramm Theater, and many others.
There was an appreciable amount of disagreement among the East German and West German artists due to their conflicting views and concepts for the space. In the meantime, however, Tacheles has become a central part of the art, activist, exhibition and communication scenes in Berlin, and is officially registered as Tacheles, e. V.. In 1996 and 1997, politicians, sociologists, architects, and artists discussed the preservation and future use of the complex at Metropolis Berlin, Hochgeschwindigkeitsarchitektur (Metropolis Berlin, High Speed Architecture).
The building was painted in bright colors and a large courtyard behind the building holds several sculptures erected using rubble, debris, vehicles and other objects. It became an art centre with a cafe, cinema, performance space, workshops and exhibition space.
Tacheles provided inspiration for a scene in the German film Good Bye Lenin!
, according to commentary by director Wolfgang Becker
on the US DVD release.
The lease with the property owner expired at the end of 2008 and the future of the art centre became uncertain.
scheduled an eviction, but it was not carried out. Instead, on the next day, the gastronomy and cinema left the building peacefully in return for a payment of 1 Million Euros from an anonymous source. Eighty artists vowed to stay on with their ateliers and metal workshops. One week later, the sequestrator ordered an almost 3 m tall wall to be built, separating the Oranienburger Straße from the building's courtyard. The future concept for the building remains undecided.
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, a large (9000 square meter) building on Oranienburger Straße in the district known as Mitte
Mitte
Mitte is the first and most central borough of Berlin. It was created in Berlin's 2001 administrative reform by the merger of the former districts of Mitte proper, Tiergarten and Wedding; the resulting borough retained the name Mitte. It is one of the two boroughs which comprises former West and...
. Huge, colorful graffiti-style murals are painted on the exterior walls, and modern art sculptures are featured inside. The building houses an artists collective which is threatened with eviction.
Originally called "Friedrichsstadtpassagen", it was built as a department store in the Jewish quarter (Scheunenviertel
Scheunenviertel
Scheunenviertel refers to a neighborhood of Mitte in the centre of Berlin. It is situated to the north of the medieval Altberlin area, east of the Rosenthaler Straße and Hackescher Markt...
) of Berlin, next to the synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
. After serving as a Nazi prison for a short while, it was later partially demolished. After the Berlin Wall
Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was a barrier constructed by the German Democratic Republic starting on 13 August 1961, that completely cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin...
had come down, it was taken over by artists, who called it Tacheles, Yiddish for "straight talking." The building contained ateliers and workshops, a nightclub, and a cinema.
Friedrichstraßenpassage
The building was constructed over the course of 15 months in 1907 and 1908 under the watch of the imperial building office (kaiserlicher Baurat) Franz Ahrens. The building complex stretched from Friedrichstraße to Oranienburger Straße. The passage had entrances from both sides and served to connect the two main thoroughfares. The Friedrichstraßenpassage was the second largest of its kind in the city and the only remaining piece of large passage architecture in Europe. The construction expenses totaled approximately 7 million German markGerman mark
The Deutsche Mark |mark]], abbreviated "DM") was the official currency of West Germany and Germany until the adoption of the euro in 2002. It is commonly called the "Deutschmark" in English but not in German. Germans often say "Mark" or "D-Mark"...
s.
The five-story building was made of reinforced concrete
Reinforced concrete
Reinforced concrete is concrete in which reinforcement bars , reinforcement grids, plates or fibers have been incorporated to strengthen the concrete in tension. It was invented by French gardener Joseph Monier in 1849 and patented in 1867. The term Ferro Concrete refers only to concrete that is...
with a colossal ribbed dome. The façade was built to be dependent upon this concrete frame. There were several small businesses on both sides of the large covered passage. The building is typically treated as an example of early Modern architecture but exhibits aspects of both Classic
Classical architecture
Classical architecture is a mode of architecture employing vocabulary derived in part from the Greek and Roman architecture of classical antiquity, enriched by classicizing architectural practice in Europe since the Renaissance...
and Gothic
Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished during the high and late medieval period. It evolved from Romanesque architecture and was succeeded by Renaissance architecture....
styles. The complex also housed its own pneumatic tube
Pneumatic tube
Pneumatic tubes are systems in which cylindrical containers are propelled through a network of tubes by compressed air or by partial vacuum...
system for sending mail and materials within the building.
A group of individual shareholders hoped to establish a market advantage by capitalizing on a common location. The concept meant that stores would not be strictly separated from one another, but would instead be allowed to overlap. This was enabled by the existence of a central point-of-sale terminal, where all customers would pay for their goods. But a mere 6 months after its opening the passage had to file for bankruptcy in August 1908. The complex was then rented by Wolf Wertheim, who in 1909 opened a new department store, which operated until 1914. The building was auctioned off shortly before World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
It is unclear how the building was used between 1914 and 1924. In 1924, among other additions to the building, a deep cellar was built. This cellar still exists today and is also known as the Tresorraum. The height of the ceiling in the passage was lowered to that of the stores, which changed the appearance of the building completely.
Haus der Technik
After 1928 the building was used as a show room by the Allgemeine Elektrizitäts-GesellschaftAEG
Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft was a German producer of electrical equipment founded in 1883 by Emil Rathenau....
(General Electric Company). It was renamed Haus der Technik by the proprietor, the Berliner Commerz- und Privatbank. The AEG used the space to display products and advise customers. The former AEG show room, located at Luisenstraße 35, had been destroyed by a fire on September 15, 1927. The new space covered over 113,000 sq ft (10,500 sq. meters) and used 20 large display cases. One of the first German television transmissions took place here during the 1930s.
Use by the NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers' Party)
In the early 1930s, the building was increasingly used by Nazi party members. In the mid-30s, the German Workers Front established offices for Gau Kurmark and became owners of the building in 1941. At the same time it became the central office for the SS.In 1943 the skylights were closed and the corresponding ridge turrets removed, so that French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
war prisoners could be held in the attic. During the Battle of Berlin
Battle of Berlin
The Battle of Berlin, designated the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, was the final major offensive of the European Theatre of World War II....
the second cellar was flooded by the Nazis and remains underwater today. The building was heavily damaged during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, though a large portion of it survived intact.
Use in the GDR
In 1948 the building was taken over by the Free German Trade Union FederationFree German Trade Union Federation
The Free German Trade Union Federation, in German Freier Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund , was the trade union federation in East Germany. It was part of the National Front and had representatives in the Volkskammer....
(FDGB) and deteriorated over the course of the next several years. Various retailers and craft businesses temporarily moved into the ruins, especially on the Friedrichstraße side. The German Travel Agency used the repaired passage section and several floors above ground. Among others, there was an artists' school, a technical school for foreign trade and economics, and office spaces for RTF (Rundfunk- und Fernmelde-Technik), a company dealing with radio and transmission technology. The cellar was used by the National People's Army
National People's Army
The National People’s Army were the armed forces of the German Democratic Republic .The NVA was established in 1956 and disestablished in 1990. There were frequent reports of East German advisors with Communist African countries during the Cold War...
.
The movie theater Camera was located in the Friedrichstraße gateway area, but was forced to leave in 1958 due to the worsening condition of the building. The presentation hall was dismantled, but was later reopened under the name OTL (Oranienburger Tor Lichtspiele). During the reconstruction work the facade was partially changed and a lobby area was built to house cash registers and checkout aisles. The roof was also rebuilt. This created the current entryway. The movie theater is still used today as a theater area, and after further reconstruction in 1972, it was renamed Camera.
Partial demolition
The demolition
Demolition
Demolition is the tearing-down of buildings and other structures, the opposite of construction. Demolition contrasts with deconstruction, which involves taking a building apart while carefully preserving valuable elements for re-use....
began in 1980. The dome was torn down and the movie theater closed. The remaining portions of the building were scheduled to be demolished in April 1990.
Artists' Initiative Tacheles
On February 13, 1990, two months before the planned detonation, the group Künstlerinitative Tacheles occupied the building. The group tried to prevent the demolition through discussions with the building management in Berlin-Mitte, which was legally responsible for the complex, by registering the building as an historic place. The planned demolition was not delayed however, until the group managed to get the Berlin Round Table to issue a last-minute injunction.The artists' initiative had a new engineering survey done to evaluate the building's structural integrity. The study found that the building was in surprisingly good shape, and it was named a historic landmark shortly thereafter. Its status was officially recognized after a second survey done in February 1992.
In the beginning the centre was run by well-known curator Jochen Sandig who expanded the building considerably. In its early days, Tacheles provided both housing and work space for its artist residents. In 1991, the associated housing burnt down, and there was considerable suspicion that the fire was started deliberately in order to pave the way for a new art centre. Among the early exhibitors were artist Mark Divo
Mark Divo
Mark Divo is a Luxembourgeois conceptual artist and curator who organises large scale interactive art projects incorporating the work of a number of well-known underground artists. His own work involves performance, photography, installation, often using found material.-Career:Between 1988 and...
, sculptors the Mutoid Waste Company
Mutoid Waste Company
The Mutoid Waste Company was a performance arts group founded in the United Kingdom by Joe Rush and Robin Cooke in the early 1980s which continued until the 1990s, when it was based in Italy....
, musicians Spiral Tribe
Spiral Tribe
Spiral Tribe is a free party sound system which existed in the first half of the 1990s, and became active again in 2007. The collective originated in west London and later travelled across Europe and North America. According to one member, the name came to him when he was at work, staring at a...
, theatre group DNTT, performance artist Lennie Lee
Lennie Lee
Lennie Lee is a South African conceptual artist who lives and works in London.-Life and career:Lennie Lee is a British artist born in Johannesburg, South Africa. He moved to the UK in 1960. He was educated at Dulwich college in London before winning a scholarship to study philosophy at Christ...
, dancer/ choreographer Sasha Waltz
Sasha Waltz
Sasha Alexandra Waltz is a German choreographer, dancer and leader of the dance company Sasha Waltz and Guests.- Biography :...
, Ramm Theater, and many others.
There was an appreciable amount of disagreement among the East German and West German artists due to their conflicting views and concepts for the space. In the meantime, however, Tacheles has become a central part of the art, activist, exhibition and communication scenes in Berlin, and is officially registered as Tacheles, e. V.. In 1996 and 1997, politicians, sociologists, architects, and artists discussed the preservation and future use of the complex at Metropolis Berlin, Hochgeschwindigkeitsarchitektur (Metropolis Berlin, High Speed Architecture).
Use until 2011
Tacheles provided inspiration for a scene in the German film Good Bye Lenin!
Good Bye Lenin!
Good Bye, Lenin! is a 2003 German tragicomedy film, released internationally in 2003. Directed by Wolfgang Becker, the cast includes Daniel Brühl, Katrin Saß, Chulpan Khamatova, and Maria Simon...
, according to commentary by director Wolfgang Becker
Wolfgang Becker
Wolfgang Becker is a German film director and writer. He is best known to the international audience for his work Good Bye Lenin! .-Biography:...
on the US DVD release.
The lease with the property owner expired at the end of 2008 and the future of the art centre became uncertain.
Present time
On 4 April 2011 the owner HSH NordbankHSH Nordbank
HSH Nordbank is a commercial bank in northern Europe with headquarters in Hamburg as well as Kiel, Germany. It is active in corporate and private banking. HSHs main focus is on shipping, transportation, real estate and renewable energy....
scheduled an eviction, but it was not carried out. Instead, on the next day, the gastronomy and cinema left the building peacefully in return for a payment of 1 Million Euros from an anonymous source. Eighty artists vowed to stay on with their ateliers and metal workshops. One week later, the sequestrator ordered an almost 3 m tall wall to be built, separating the Oranienburger Straße from the building's courtyard. The future concept for the building remains undecided.