Welcoming address

from Berlin's Secretary for Culture, André Schmitz, to 48 Stunden Neukölln

For years now, the festival of the arts known as “48 Stunden Neukölln“ has been offering ample opportunities to observe the development of cultural activity in Neukölln in the form of a weekend of activiy. This “progress report“ shows that there is, indeed, a rather lively arts scene in the district. Statistics also prove this trend: over the last two years alone, the amount of venues participating in the festival has doubled to 340 differrent places. In some corners of northern Neukölln, these numbers have even trebled.

This is evidence of the fact that northern Neukölln has, like other parts of the city, developed dynamically as an area where substantial world-class culture is made. Certain districts, which have a reputation for being “problematic“, offering, in comparison with other cities internationally, conditions for the development of alternative art and cultural activity, exceptionally good conditions for making art. In Neukölln, more established cultural institutions, such as the Neuköllner Opera, co-exist with smaller independant spaces, galleries, small theatres and artists' initiatives, which now give a prospering view of this currently trendy area.

Northern-Neukölln has approximately 160,000 inhabitants from around 165 different countries. It is the ideal place to experiment with notions of how culture integrates an otherwise disillusioned populace. Here, cultural activity is not restricted to members of the educated middle classes. The universal nature of art is that it touches a nerve, across all segments of the population, from all backgrounds? Are art projects a way to motivate pupils? To what extent can a city in financially difficult straits benefit from the positive impact of cultural activity, leading to a new sense identity in the area?

Definitive answers to these cultural and socio-political questions have yet to be found. Yet this conceptionally thrilling, and therefore very successful festival provides hopes that are manifest in visible changes in the cultural sector, which could also have an effect on other parts of society. Bringing art to the street, making it part of people's everyday lives in a way that they can relate to takes the elitist aura away from art. Right in the middle of this densel-populated hustle and bustle, new opportunities for relaying ideas, expanding horizons, and challenges to be met in the future can be found.

I'd like to wish the festival and all those visiting events during the weekend three exciting days of thrilling impulses for perceiving art as well as interpersonal interaction...