Readings
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A literary series to accompany the exhibition Wohnkomplex
Monthly readings will accompany the current exhibition Wohnkomplex: Art and Life in Plattenbau, inviting visitors to engage in a literary exploration of architecture, prefabricated buildings in the GDR, and their critical reflection in the present day.
Picking up on the exhibition’s question of how East German Plattenbau complexes are addressed in visual art, authors provide literary inspiration, explore new narratives, and situate stories about life in prefabricated buildings in the GDR within a contemporary context.
Renowned authors such as Katja Oskamp, Florentine Anders, Hendrik Bolz, and Grit Lemke present their books in a variety of ways.
The readings, moderated by Maria-Christina Piwowarski, take place once a month in Café Hedwig or in the foyer of DAS MINSK. The event ticket includes a visit to the exhibition from 5 PM. The events are in German.
Book cover »Die Allee« by Florentine Anders © Galiani Berlin
FRI, October 17, 2025, 7 PM (Sold out)
Florentine Anders, Die Allee, 2025, Verlag Kiepenheuer & Witsch
Hermann Henselmann is one of the most important architects of the GDR, who designed, among other things, Stalinallee (now Karl-Marx-Allee) and the East Berlin TV tower. As chief architect of the East Berlin magistrate, his work shaped architecture and urban planning in the GDR in the 1950s and 1960s.
In her novel Die Allee, his granddaughter Florentine Anders tells the fascinating story of her family in the context of socialist architectural history.
Steeped in the ideas of the Bauhaus and the avant-garde, the charismatic idealist Hermann Henselmann rose to become chief architect of East Berlin after the war, where he was expected to compete with West Berliners such as Scharoun & Co. The price: he had to constantly maneuver and at times even grovel in order to save at least the foundations of his modernist ideas from the rigid expectations of the political leadership. And then there is Henselmann’s wife Isi, a highly talented woman who also wanted to work as an architect, but had to struggle with a family that had grown to eight children. Constantly picking up the pieces left behind by her husband, she increasingly emancipated herself. Their daughter Isa escaped the control of her choleric father, seeking her own path. (Kiepenheuer & Witsch)
This highly acclaimed novel combines architecture, contemporary history, and family history, and is one of the most powerful recent works dealing with the GDR. Florentine Anders vividly describes the tension between socialist utopia and the stifling reality of real socialism.
At Café Hedwig, the author will read from her book this evening and talk with Maria-Christina Piwowarski about the complex world of architecture, the history of emancipation, and the creation of her novel.
Thu, November 20, 2025, 7 PM
Hendrik Bolz, Nullerjahre. Jugend in blühenden Landschaften, 2022, Verlag Kiepenheuer & Witsch
Hendrik Bolz, member of the band Zugezogen Maskulin, has transformed what he typically expresses in poetic, hard-hitting rap into literature. His novel Nullerjahre brings his post-reunification youth in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania to life, recounting his upbringing in Stralsund, a city that had long since ceased to be part of the GDR, but where Western normality could only be found in RTL’s afternoon programming. (Kiepenheuer & Witsch)
In a bluntly authentic and entertaining autobiographical style, the author and rapper chronicles his childhood and youth in rural Mecklenburg at the turn of the millennium, recounting brutal experiences of violence, the omnipresence of right-wing extremists, and how he used alcohol and drugs as a means of escaping the harsh reality of his life. Bolz underscores his own personal experiences with well-researched facts about the socio-political background.
Nullerjahre is a blend of pop literature, coming-of-age narrative, and sociological research, and has since been adapted for the stage by numerous theaters.
On this evening, the author will read from his book and speak with Maria-Christina Piwowarski about the painful aftermath of the GDR in East Germany, how the 2000s shaped an entire generation, and transformation processes in East Germany after reunification. This special evening encourages both personal and social reflection.
Book cover: Nullerjahre by Hendrik Bolz © Kiepenheuer & Witsch
Book cover: »Kinder von Hoy« by Grit Lemke © Suhrkamp Verlag
Book cover: »Kinder von Hoy« by Grit Lemke © Suhrkamp Verlag
WED, December 10, 2025, 7 PM
Grit Lemke, Kinder von Hoy: Freiheit, Glück und Terror, 2021, Suhrkamp Verlag
Hoyerswerda—once a model city in the GDR: carved out of the heathland, assembled from pre-fabricated elements, a place where parents left each morning in shift buses and children grew up in a collective. A city that gained sad notoriety through the racist riots of 1991. In her documentary novel, Grit Lemke weaves together the voices of the children of Hoy to create a stirring oral history that gives voice to a generation for whom dreams and trauma were closely intertwined.
She brings together conversations with friends and family and recounts her own life in Hoyerswerda as part of a proletarian bohemian scene centered around Gerhard Gundermann, who met in a basement club at night and worked hard during the day. When neo-Nazis carried out the first post-war pogrom after reunification, the cultural scene stood idly by. Nothing was ever the same again. (Suhrkamp Verlag)
Grit Lemke paints an impressively lasting portrait of her generation and the country in which she lived. During this evening at Café Hedwig, the author and director will read from her book and share selected photos.
Together with Maria-Christina Piwowarski, she will talk about Hoyerswerda, the loss of pride in the city, changes and upheavals during# the post-reunification period, and a new, younger generation in her hometown.
Short biography Maria-Christina Piwowarski
Maria-Christina Piwowarski was born in Haldensleben in 1982 and grew up in a small village in the Magdeburger Börde. She is a trained bookseller and most recently managed the Berlin bookshop ocelot. Together with Ludwig Lohmann, she has been running the blauschwarzberlin literature podcast since 2019, which has been broadcast as a livestream from the Staatsbibliothek Berlin since the fall. She moderates readings and events in the cultural sector and writes. In fall 2024, she published the anthology Und ich - 20 Geschichten von Wendepunkten des Lebens.
Maria-Christina Piwowarski © Andreas Schmidt
