When the restoration of the city's longest remaining section of the Berlin Wall began in 2009, a place that became the "world's largest open air gallery" after 1989 and had been the most potent symbol of division and reunification, filmmakers Karin Kaper and Dirk Szuszies started documenting the changes. In BERLIN EAST SIDE GALLERY the artists’ voices and images compose a colorful mosaic. They attest to freedom and to art, to the freedom of art and the art of freedom that was channeled in the fight of local initiatives against the interests of rich investors and developers who would like to build up the banks of the river Spree in the district of Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg. The personal flashbacks of the protagonists accompanied by archival footage, illustrate how a symbol of state oppression and division has shifted to a symbol of hope, solidarity and self-determination. The audience can come to their own conclusions -there is no commentary– however the question of what kind of city and what kind of society do we actually want to live in is posed nonetheless. The film BERLIN EAST SIDE GALLERY is more than just a historical document, a document of art or social stock taking.

Jens Mayer