Künstler fürs Leben

NO ONE CAN WAKE UP
Lasse Lau and Kenneth A. Balfelt

We have individual identities only because of and in relation to others. Through per-ceiving differences, we come to understand ourselves: To see how "others" structure their lives, how their traffic is organized, and how their public services differ: all are ways to establish an understanding of the fact that the way things work at "home" is only one possible paradigm, rather than an ideal or truth.

We will look at "other" structures and use a specifically developed method of trans-lating them in order to unveil new meaning.

A city like Berlin reveals many "alternative" structures, social movements and self-organizing institutions, which exist in the context of the "Lebensreformen" (Life Reform) movements. Those structures often work at levels that are parallel to and in opposition to established economic and political powers, and therefore must challenge new aes-thetical thinking about representation in places like Hamburger Bahnhof.

This project is a platform meant to start a dialogue about ethics, aesthetics, about how we live our lives, and more importantly about how we encounter "the Other". In the process, we need to acknowledge that we are strangers ourselves.

In this world of growing uncertainty about how to live side by side with different peo-ples, structures and ideas, we still need to establish a field for translations - a space where we are able to benefit from each other's differences as love.