From September to December, Ballhaus Naunynstraße is hosting Republik Repair – Ten Points, Ten Demands, One Festival, curated by Karina Griffith.

The festival uses theatre, film music and storytelling to negotiate the issue of reparations: Black artists and artists of color, activists and theorists respond to the inequalities, exclusions and acts of violence with demands, concepts, projections of the future and self- empowerment. The approach focuses on the experiences of Black people in Berlin and their demands.

Reparations for enslavement, slave trade and colonialism are being internationally negotiated on a political and judicial level; these demands are receiving increased media attention. In Germany the issue is also being increasingly addressed, not least due to the complaint that was filed against the Federal Republic of Germany by representatives of the Herero and Nama in New York earlier this year. Demands for reparations do not only refer to monetary compensation but also address issues of apology, processing, perspective. As long as the history of violence and exploitation is not reflected in and by society, racism will be systemically passed on – and access to fundamental rights, fundamental freedoms and elementary services will continue to be blocked for people of African descent.

In 2014, the Reparations Commission (CRC) of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) demanded compensation from former colonial powers The Netherlands, Great Britain and France for colonial crimes and the enslavement of Black people.

Republik Repair invites artists, musicians, scholars, performers and activist to come up with their political and artistic adaptations and translations of the Caribbean Community’s ten points for the German context and to make their own demands. The ten demands of the Caribbean Ten Point Action Plan:

1. FULL FORMAL APOLOGY,

2. REPATRIATION,

3. INDIGENOUS PEOPLES DEVELOPMENT,

4. CULTURAL INSTITUTIONS,

5. PUBLIC HEALTH CRISIS,

6. ILLITERACY IRRADICATION,

7. AFRICAN KNOWLEDGE PROGRAM,

8. PSYCHOLOGICAL REHABILITATION,

9. TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER,

10. DEBT CANCELLATION.

Ten demands, ten steps for reparations, but also – as the festival‘s curator Karina Griffith stresses – ten points that reach far beyond the Caribbean states and represent a programme for overcoming the systemic political inequalities, therefore offering a model for all Black Communities in Europe, in Berlin.

The Republik Repair festival programme opens up a resonance chamber for CARICOM’s 10-Point Action Plan. It creates a platform for artists, musicians, writers and scholars invited to interrogate the ten points regarding their significance for Black Communities in Europe, particularly in Berlin. In a confluence of art and knowledge transfer, of international guests and local protagonists, the festival provides crucial inspiration for the German discussion around reparations.

With a three-month programme, six panels and more than fifteen events, Republik Repair presents the artistic work and political perspectives of Black cultural producers in Germany and Europe and places them in an international context. Juxtaposed with international positions, local developments and demands are complemented and framed in substantial ways; the political demands are given a new objective in terms of Reparatory Imaginings. Being the largest festival from Black perspectives in Germany, Republik Repair is an important step towards the visibility of Black positions and diversity in Germany.

Republik Repair creates a platform for strong Black perspectives and artistic talent, following the tradition of the festivals We are Tomorrow: Visions and Retrospection on Occasion of the 1884 Berlin Conference (2015) and Black Lux: A Homeland Festival of Black Perspectives (2013) at Ballhaus Nauynstraße.

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An event series by Kultursprünge at Ballhaus Naunynstraße gemeinnützige GmbH. Financed with funds from the Land Berlin, Senate Department for Culture and Europe as well as funds from the Federal Agency for Civic Education (Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung/bpb).

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www.ballhausnaunynstrasse.de