It's some kind of documentary what I'm doing here, because this building will be disappearing
there very soon.
Those subjects have no money as all the ministries of Berlin got, you know, no money.
There's no money they bought these banners from, those banners are their concept for the whole Schlossplatz.
Tell me a little bit about that, why do they do that?
No, I think I'm kind of too emotional about that. And there's lots of things I could tell you about the dreams that could have been built inside.
The dreams that have kind of been torn down now, in progress, to be torn down.
My approach to the building until then was like, perhaps like everybody who's kind of aesthetic view on the city or from west part of Germany also, my origin is kind of, this is a big, big, ugly box.
So they were just kind of, they had a parliament room to tell the world we got a parliament and it's a big house in the middle of the town and look, we got parties and we got free elections, so-called free elections.
So I can now, where you ask, remember that there was a broadcast broadcast from the parliament, the pseudo-parliament, and then they said to me, my mother, that they are also sitting in the palace of the republic now.
But I didn't connect that with the glissar lamp and, no, but now I just want to ask you, I had to cancel it.
I don't know if it's for you, but I got it from a different perspective, but for me, for example, this parliament seat of the republic actually didn't matter at all, did you take it otherwise?
I didn't take it at all.
So it wasn't like that on the one hand, that the people fought and then the accordionists ran over and celebrated, but they had their area and went home and the people had their area and had a party.
Of course, it was also in the palace of the republic that it was built, a conception that it is actually a hall for sports and for politics.
So, what was finally said, the house was only a political house, it doesn't fit.
It was in the year of the highest, two to three political events. The remaining 350 days we made culture in the house.
From the bottom, from the bowling bar, from the beer bar, from the wine bar, to the fifth floor.
Something happened every day.
There the people's room had their seat and that was the official part of the palace and otherwise there were a lot of restaurants there.
It was a different kind. There was a bowling bar, there was a wine bar, there was a very modern one.
So that was really Europe-wide in the most modern theater.
So, the big hall in the palace of the Republic was an arena stage, that is, like a Greek amphitheater.
So that the people were sitting on the barbed wire and the stage.
Every visitor, up to the last place, the same quality was delivered to the one sitting in front of the stage.
The theater was unimaginable, because you can't hear anything in the rear seats.
It was all controlled, tower-wise, light-wise. For example, I couldn't put a wall where I know that Paris is and there is London.
Because the ones sitting behind there, they looked behind there. So I had to work only in space.
And that was a very big challenge. It was fantastic.
Always only thinking in space. And the studio architecture came to me very well.
That I worked with it all the time. And not only like in the theater.
An example, for example, from Ravel, the Bolero. It starts very slowly and increases over 13 minutes.
I only had a dance pair on the stage. I put that in a sport.
The whole hall was dark and only had a very shiny, bright red line, like a laser.
And within these 13 minutes of the Bolero or 14, the line continued to open.
But very slowly, the viewer didn't notice it at all.
And at the last sound of Ravel, the Bolero, the whole hall was like blood red suddenly.
It wasn't too big. It was really big. It was really special.
Everything was glittering. It was like a castle.
Yes, it was like a fairy tale.
In the overall context of the GDR, this whole dream of peace is rich.
We have peace, we have harmony, we have work for everyone.
We let peace rise every day. Well, this idea or this dream was reality for us.
We didn't know that it was an illusion and that the GDR always has less money for such things.
And we believed that we could be all cosmonauts and that all the states, the earth would be socialist at some point.
All the people loved each other and worked together. We fell in love with each other.
And the Palazzo Republic was, so to speak, the castle of this dream.
Yes, it was. But everything was glittering, just like you imagine the castle with a fairy tale.
Everything was glittering.
And then the stairs came down. And these wide, big stairs with carpet and everything was so fine, floor carpet.
It was so glittering. And we were all super glittering.
It was a beautiful corner, wasn't it?
There was. There was.
What else was there?
There was, above all, a huge foyer where you just went with guests,
who you showed the city, took a little break,
sat in huge, huge leather seats or couches, got a drink from the bar.
And simply, during the city boomings, she didn't turn out to be there.
We are not just guests.
She says now, visitors.
So we basically just went in, when I was doing a city boom, or in the center, Berlin 2.
And that was in the center, just to eat ice on the terrace, to sit down.
So an open building, a real palace, and a real palace for Republic.
So the Republic could go into its palace.
It was always open, go inside, have fun there, go to restaurants, go to theater, go to whatever venues.
And be sure, at the same time, this is also our building, but also represents our state and our parliament needs that.
The whole architectural idea of how to do a program in the middle of the city of a Republic,
as we also are with the Democratic Republic still, is a really good program.
So it is kind of really futurism in fact.
And that was, for example, the following experience. I was in 1990 in front of the reunions in the house.
We did a wonderful show with Angelika Milster and Andre Bauer and other artists.
And they suddenly came into the house and the Palace of Republic didn't have anything to do with it.
And that's a sign of the Palace of Republic. The president of the Palace of Republic is forbidden from employees immediately.
That means I was able to go home again, and my job was closed.
We often have that today.
And that's what I first learned 15, 16 years ago, how to run something like that.
So lots of people divide there to brainstorm about whatever could we do inside.
And there's a theater in Berlin, the one from the theater, a woman and another architect who is kind of interested in the Palace,
went to say, we want to have a key until they tear it down. You have no money to tear it down right now.
You got no good plan to do what to do with the ground afterwards. Please give us the key.
We want to have fun inside. We want to show it to the people.
We want to have theater, architecture, exhibition, whatever venues inside.
Young people of Berlin want to go into the Palace. Please give us the key.
What has happened to this building afterwards is really, really interesting because this has become a place for art.
And there have been a lot of people from all the cities of all ages and all kinds of interests going here for exhibitions and for parties, for kinds of music.
But also it made much power into the minds of the people who did it inside.
We said, oh yes, this is such a great place and we are kind of really the Republic. We don't want to be the Republic of GDR anymore.
But look, we are the Republic. We went inside here and just did our Palace of Republic. It's our Palace now.
So it was taken. The point was it was now really taken.
Do you know what happened inside? And what was done in the Palace in the last 15 years through the Luhuisenhof-Band, I think, was such a good event.
That the people of Schlange were standing outside.
So there was no toilet, there was no more gastronomy, there was nothing. They could only see the exhibition.
Great, again. When is the next exhibition? And that was not good. And that is the most important thing, to put something there.
Or it's bad to travel a little away from what was already there. You could have continued it.
And this is so stupid. If I have a apartment and I live in it for 40 years and I was set up and have, what do I know, a couch, a closet or something.
And the closet is 13 years old and the closet makes me have fun and I'm happy and so on.
And suddenly a new woman came to me, because my old one is gone. The new woman says, the closet has to get out.
She just looks like she's getting married. What is he supposed to do here? Please tell me, that's my closet.
Try to use the closet first. Maybe you'll like it too. First open the doors of the closet.
Look how nice the compartments are, what you get in there. All the drawers and so on and so forth.
Yes, that was a good comparison, I hope.
Go inside of this building and then do a kind of better and a kind of reasonable and a kind of really understandable decision to tear it down.
And it looks like you couldn't tear it down today. Tear it down if you got a good plan.
Tear it down when you get the money for the new castle.
The decision twice has been made in the parliament before, once 2002, once 2003.
And again it has been confirmed in the beginning of 2006 on 19th of January and this really went up with a big steel hammer to our heads.
You can imagine.
I've been in Hamburg for 5 years and I've been with guests in Berlin for a few times. They didn't understand why this city was going around with the past.
You can't just say that there is so much past in this place. On the one hand there is still this door of the castle.
On the other hand there is still this door of the entrance of the castle and on the other hand there is still this part of the past.
And also not everything that happened there. You can understand that.
The part where the people just celebrated and felt comfortable. It wasn't bad.
It is so much space in the castle that the relic would have fit in there.
It would still be enough space for other things.
It was almost as if it was the variant.
It just doesn't fit politically.
Politically.
But the palace republic, and that is interesting, was just a prestige object of the old DDR and it had to be removed.
Whoever pays it, how he pays it and so on, what comes there, no one knows.
And I think that's so disgusting.
The most important question for me is what should happen in there.
When the castle facade is there and hotels are created, or what do I know, high schools for elite students or something like that,
then the whole facade is useless.
Because the people want to go in to the middle point.
And if they can go in and experience something, and also the whole abroad tourists are in Berlin.
You walk along and suddenly there is a building.
I want to see what's in there.
Then I don't care if it has such a facade or such a facade.
And that's why we need the castle.
The castle used to belong to a emperor.
And the castle had an interior.
No one came in there.
The emperor was there, no one was there.
And the castle was, what do I know, used by the emperor four times a year.
But when you talk, we want to have the castle again.
Because there is no emperor anymore.
There are no lackeys anymore.
What should happen in there?
Do we want to have the facade again or do we want to have the interior again?
Who can use this castle?
Who can use this castle?
Do you think you can go into a castle and just drink a lemonade?
Well, that's a problem now.
You know, I laugh at the end of the day when I say,
and what do you have to do against it?
What does that mean?
The old man has to leave first.
But where is the new one?
And that's my question.
Then, we did kind of the last attempt.
So we had to do something short, pregnant, sexy about our palace.
So we were singing for it,
Einigkeit and Rechten and Freiheit for the palace of Republic.
And we also did a banner.
A banner 1 meter 50 miles, 30 meters.
And it was all full of policemen.
And we had of course no permission to go inside or over the fence or whatever.
But we managed to put up the banner in the night before
and we were just lying there already connected.
And we also managed to go up inside and up while we were singing
and folded it down.
And of course, this building is so big and we all know it so well.
So that we of course had lots of ways to go inside
with no policemen seeing us.
I mean, I was obsessed.
I was seeing them running into the building, the policemen,
when it has been started to come down the banner.
And I knew they couldn't be here in 10 minutes, before 10 minutes.
Because they need nearly 10 minutes to find the staircase
that leads up the whole way.
And I guess on this Saturday, I don't know.
We made our own peace with the building somehow.
I mean, it was our last attempt and it's the first time for me to come back since.
Yes.
Because I mean, lots of positive emotional energy.
You build up about a thing, about a place, about room
and about people you unite with about this room.
This comes down really hard to the ground.
There's people like that.
There's people like that.
