CURSED LANDSCAPES

here’s some places I created games and pieces for (+ some thoughts about it).

i believe that it is important to learn about the history of a place for which a set/venue/immersive stage is to be designed in a site-specific way (for the sake of the design alone and ofc for many other reasons).

but ugh
it’s painful
especially when you live & work in germany

I guess it can be done in ways that are painful in a good way?
type100 fun. Idk. type88 fun.

(1) historical map of concentration camps in germany – source: spurensuche-bremen.de
(2) esoteric nazi graffitti in the prehistoric “lippold’s cave” near alfeld, a photo I took when scouting locations for RÄUBERLEBEN [2019]

here’s a challenge (difficulty level: ultra hard): finde a place for a site specific work in germany, that does not have an absurdly cruel past.

of course not too many owners of such locations are happy to address this. „hey wanna go play a cozy hobbit larp on the grounds of a former concentration camp?“

(3) performing with ANTONIO SCHMIDT in the basement of a bar in berlin that used to be a slaughterhouse / CRYSTAL HEAVEN LOUNGE [2019] by DOS.FAIL, photo by SIMON SALEM MÜLLER / VG BILD-KUNST BONN

(4) & (5) the “spitalseebunker” in schweinfurt. a bunker from WW2 and our locations for HEALING [2021] with DOS.FAIL

(6) a steel line at KAMPNAGEL, hamburg. this important place for the off-stage theatre community has a history with forced labour in the third reich. SOPHIA HUSSAIN (and others) is actually working with KAMPNAGEL on the aufarbeitung of this at the moment: “zwangsarbeit & widerstand“. picture from the rehearsals for DAS REVIER [2022]. for NOCLIP:FEVERDREAM [2023] we wanted people to engage with the history of the places surrounding them, but when we presented the game at B.A.L.L. CONFERENCE at KAMPNAGEL and after being provided with many insights from SOPHIA, we uh…. decided to skip that part here.

(7) the entrance to the vault at ALTE MÜNZE, berlin. picture from our first walk-through when creating NIGHTCRAWLERS [2023].

(8) military training ground near hildesheim, an important place for the local larp community. picture of the local group.

(9) a tunnel at the larp location STEINZEICHEN in western germany. when we went location scouting for EXVOTO [2021] with MARIE S. ZWINZSCHER and MOTHER, we stumbled into this tunnel and found out that the place used to be part of a concentration camp.

(10), (11) & (12): pictures from DAS HALBE LEID [2017] at “wiesendamm 30” in hamburg. the place was built as a factory hall for forced labour in the third reich. when my grandma was a child, her father would stop the car every day on the way to school to spit on the building. now people are producing theatre here. we lived and worked there for half a year for DAS HALBE LEID. after lots of renovation work it is now the domain of “junges schauspiel hamburg”. photos by ERICH GOLDMANN.

(13) a bunker in the forest near derneburg that we used for the fantasy larp SIEBENSPRUNG III [2012]. the bunker is in the middle of the “laves pfad”, built by architect georg laves for the “house of welf”, one of the oldest aristocratic families in europe. it’s a weird place, so people larp there.

(14) & (15): two phallic monuments for worshipping a famous german warmonger. the “bismarck tower” (14) on top of the “galgenberg” (engl: “gallow hill”) in hildesheim used to be a popular location for larps. there’s several dozens of these towers spread all over germany and they all look similar. (15) is the “bismarck statue” in hamburg that i used in my film SEX IN DEUTSCHLAND.

(16) another bunker near “lippold’s cave”, scouted for RÄUBERLEBEN and part of our set for WITHOUT A SOUND music video.

“this house makes it hard to larp
this country makes it hard to larp
that’s not hooow to larp me
that’s not how to larp me
that’s not hoooooow to larp me
that’s not how to larp me”