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On The Road To Mama’s 75th Birthday Party

On the road. Summer turning into autumn. From North-East to North. In a cosy car with my brother, his girlfriend and her little dog.
Clouds speeding in 3D, wind turbines turning, sun burning red.
A 3-legged-dog running happily through the grass.
Coffee is not bad at our highway rest area. Double espresso cappuccino.
To fat boys pissing in the weeds.
I love to be on the road!
Happy birthday Mama!

Music Is It

You know what I would really miss if all people in this world got ooops killed by ooops themselves, shit accident, global Monsanto errr war oooops error?

Music.

My friend Frauke got 2 tickets for the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. 3 pieces. Classical. Witold Lutosławski, Gustav Mahler, Leoš Janáček. Couldn’t be more different, diverse.
Conducted by Sir Simon Rattle, the boss of this orchestra (going to quit soon), cool, I first saw him and his work in a movie >>> Rhythm is it <<< I am a newbie. I am a nothing-knower. I observed them, the musicians, how they worked together like a swarm. Fascinating. 50 violins sounding like a bee swarm. A choir of 100 men and women singing together demonstrating a power that blew me away, I don't like clerical themes at all but they were just fantastic. Keep on rockin’!

First Bare Hir Leggs, Then Creepe Up To Hir Kneese …

I was wondering where the name dildo comes from – I came upon a very old poem …

And make me happie, stealing by degreese.

First bare hir leggs, then creepe up to hir kneese;

From thence ascend unto her mannely thigh—

(A pox on lingring when I am so nighe!).
Smock, climbe a-pace, that I maie see my ioyes;

Oh heauen and paradize are all but toyes

Compar’d with this sight I now behould,

Which well might keepe a man from being olde.

My little dilldo shall suply their kinde:

A knaue, that moues as light as leaues by winde;

That bendeth not, nor fouldeth anie deale,

But stands as stiff as he were made of steele.

Thomas Nashe, 1593

Today at Galeries Lafayette in Berlin Friedrichstrasse open Vogue night, buckets of champagne for all ladies, my friend and I went there, informed ourselves and … she won the race!!

Yummy Beer, Free Field

I was invited at Freifeld-Festival in Northern German Oldenburg last weekend to give a hand processing super 8 workshop during their inside and open air music & arts festival! That was fun and sunny and full of inspiration for everybody – me and 10 participants. Playing with 5 super 8 cameras, strolling around the festival which was situated on a large site that used to be soldiers barracks (à propos: Obama, I’d like you to return your Noble Prize. It’s really in wrong hands. It was meant for some peaceful action, not for starting a war. Sigh.)

10 people, 5 cameras, shooting 5 film rolls and developing them in a very special soup: OLs Beer, vitamin c and washing soda!
The result: wonderful negative black & white film!

Liepnitzsee I Love You!

The cleanest and most beautiful lake in / around Berlin is definitely the Liepnitzsee! Soft green clear water, happy ducks, old fashioned rowboats to rent, a ferry named „Frieda“ and a lovely café on the island, the Insulaner!
I had the most relaxing day there today (with Bernd, David and Jenna), a perfect summer day!

And I learned a new drink: „Schmunzel“ (which actually means „smirk“ or „chuckle“): it’s just orange juice with „Korn“ (corn schnapps)!

Aquasse

The coolest place to be in Nürnberg when it’s really really hot (38°!!) is the Galerie Bernsteinzimmer!
I had a little film show and exhibition there last weekend – a workshow of my films and some smaller pictures from my film stills hanging on the walls.
This place is centuries old. Cooling wooden floor, heavy stone walls and a wonderful terrace that one of Helga’s friends (forgot her name) called Aquasse instead of Terrasse because we’re looking at aqua and not on terra! Makes sense!!

Thank you Verena for organizing and Helga for everything and the best Schnittchen on earth!!

Full Steam Space Machine

I’m back in Berlin!
Took me a while …. from LA to London … then to Berlin.
These extremely beautiful beaming red dressed Ladies are stewardesses of Aeroflot / Russia! They know how to dress!

Berlin is LA’s cold little sister. I’m confused. It’s suddenly cold and not bright. I will have a nice jetlag.
That’s why I went to my favourite Burgeria around the corner (2 Americans, 1 German) and ordered a Superjalapeño Burger. And a Tyskie (Polish) beer while waiting.
They had the radio on or some private compilation … my two very personal waiting songs were “Full Steam Space Machine“ by I don’t know and then “Keep On Rockin‘ In The Free World“ by … you know.
Yeah, free world. There’s something going on right now. I feel for all who get killed right now fighting, no not even fighting: standing up for a free world.

Illy Cam

A little workshop today for Echo Park Film Center’s intimate friends Danny, Matt, Dicky, Chloé and Paolo and me of course.

We bought some Illy espresso coffee cans (the Film Center has now coffee for the next two years I guess), drilled holes, taped ready-made holes on them (I brought some from Germany, different diameters, laser drilled, from Monochrom), put sheet film inside, closed, ready! A perfect pinhole camera! The lid is absolutely light-tight!

We went into the park and shot some weird photos, then returned and developed them in … coffee! Success! At least partly! Some turned out to be overdeveloped because exposure time was more guessing than knowing … but anyway: fun and beauty!!!

Moca In And Outside

Art day for me. Riding the 4 bus downtown, there are two Mocas easily walkable from one to the other. Downtown is concrete and deserted but suddenly taken over by bikes … there was a race, don’t know for what reason, and then I remembered: Ciclavia! On Wilshire! But that’s somewhere else! Today! [CicLAvia temporarily removes cars from L.A. streets – and the streets fill up with smiles!] Like we had „autofreien Sonntag“ in Germany in the … seventies? When gas worries occured for the first time? Biking is a political attitude here and I like that.

Back to Moca. There’s a huge Urs Fischer exhibition going on in both Mocas. One has several of his works – I like the room full of 3-D rectangles like honey bear, banana, 1-dollar, things he likes I presume, their picture from all sides printed on a 3-D-mirror.

The other Moca exhibits a project of a collaboration with 1,500 LA people playing and working with clay. Gigantic. I love it.

When I walked out into the sun again I wondered whether that man on the bench was art or real ….

Same with that inscription on the building opposite Moca: art or reality?

Ten footsteps down another attraction: a camera and a projection, remembering Tōyō Miyatake (宮武東洋), who was a Japanese American photographer, best known for his photographs documenting the Japanese American people and the Japanese American internment at Manzanar during World War II.

The Ambassadors Of Coincidence In LA

Hooray!

Paolo and me we were the first two to play the game in Los Angeles!

[For those who want to know more, go to my other website www.ambassadorsofcoincidence.com, you’ll find tons of information and pictures and some films.]

It’s all about exploring your city. You can play it, too. Zigzag through your city, find paths and spots with the help of coincidence and philosophying over things, trash, objects, marks, graffiti – whatever – to get to the next spot. A street and a block or house number.

We started in the Echo Park, rolled the dice and, by narrowing down the LA street index (a sweet old book from the eighties) from pages to one page to columns to lines until we finally found our starting point: Harrington Avenue 3000!

We went there (by car of course) – a tiny street with only a few houses – and immediately stumbled upon a neat little house, embedded in roses with a striking golden statue, quite small, Buddha? A man appeared and told us that he found it in the back yard when he bought the house and it was him who painted it golden and set it up in the front. It was rather a Mary than a Buddha.

And on and on and on …. this spot led us to … Marygold Avenue! Another very short street in Harbor City. Deserted, hot, a giant beige building, a sand colored van and another one labeled „Southwind“ … three men lingering around, partly teethless … but friendly when we started to explain that we were playing a scavenger-like game. They told us about a beautiful park nearby with a lake where one good old day a crocodile was found.

And on and on and on … the whole game presented us 4 stations, we ended up in Electric Street in Silver Lake and immediately spotted a shimmering balloon tied to the electric cable above saying „hero“ …

Whow.

If you want to watch and listen to the whole story, check my website in about 1 month, it’s all been recorded and filmed … the whole trip, the whole day. Lots of footage. Going to edit a little film when I’m back in Berlin!!

This mural displaying elements … wind, water, sun, earth … plus the pipe next to it led us to „electricity“.

A beautiful park with a lake in Harbor City … and no crocodiles around!

And finally … coooool Hefeweizen and a cigarette in a beergarden in Silver Lake!!!

Jacaranda And Seaweed Soup

I filmed some Super 8 black&white films and then developed them in different soups: Jacaranda blossoms and seaweed … both mixed with vitamin c and washing soda as usual. The blossoms or the weed don’t do the job solo, it works only in combination with the other two (ph balance).

The results are amazing, the films came out beautiful, the seaweed film a little yellow-sepia! Maybe because of the salt contents? Must ask my chemist friend Thierry …

It’s hot at the Echo Park Film Center!

Jacaranda blossoms lose their sweet color as soon as you pour hot water over them …

(the yellowish image, the ocean waves: that’s a seaweed developing!
All film stills original negative and then scanned and digitally inverted)

The Filmmobile Is In The Park!

Yesterday Echo Park Film Center’s Filmmobile entered MacArthur Park and gave a free workshop for kids and older kids! Direct animation on 16 mm film! Make your own animation film with cut out paper stuff! And then: music on the stage! Yummy tacos at taco stands!

Levitt Pavilion for the Performing Arts MacArthur Park presents 50 summer concerts annually.  Admission is always FREE, making live music and the arts accessible to all!

¡Roberto Y Salvador, Un Burrito Pollo Por Favor!

… that’s almost all I can say in Spanish! Con algo hay que empezar … that was the name of my Spanish lesson book 100 years ago if I remember correctly!

That taco stand „Taco Salsa“ is located in front of the Vons parking lot during the day. The two guys are sympatico and the burrito is gigantic!

At night it miraculously changes its name and is then called „Tacozone“. Or maybe it’s another one …

Sea Scum Developer

I collected some sea weed and made a tea, strong and salty-fishy smelling and for sure not potable!
I developed a film in it … super 8 black & white … and it turned out quite light and low contrasty with a yellowish tint! Yippeeh!

Why light, why low contrast? I presume because of the salt content. Must ask my chemist friend.

Echo Aurora Under 1000 Stars And 1/2 Moon

I could not find better words, so I paste and copy the Echo Park Film Center & Villa Aurora’s words right into my blog:

Echo Park Film Center and its roving band of cinematic troubadours come to the beautiful hills of Malibu to present a night of short animated and experimental films to remind you of the beauty of life and living. Bring a blanket, a loved one and an open mind to sit under the stars and watch a collection of short films made by the Echo Park Film Center collective (& friends) between the years of 2001 – 2013.

This magical evening will include prizes and surprises, popcorn, Dagie Brundert (a visiting filmmaker from Berlin), laughter, love and the occasional tear.

All ages welcome. Sell your TV and come to the cinema. We look forward to seeing you.

*********

Now that was a wonderful event!

50 people and 1 dog enjoyed a summer evening sitting on the grass watching short films that have been made during workshops of the Film Center – so many lovely different films about flying rats, weddings in the Ukraine, Dirndl girls in rape seed fields … and so much more!

[The Villa Aurora was built in 1928 in the hills of the Pacific Palisades.
Villa Aurora is an international meeting place for artists and intellectuals fostering a lively exchange in the fields of literature, art, science and politics. It is located in the former home of exiled German-Jewish writer Lion Feuchtwanger, who founded „Der Spiegel“ in 1908, and his wife Marta.]

That was a perfect combination!!

Micheladas

I learned today: Michelada is a drink. Beer served in a glass with a salted rim (like Margarita). Plus chicken soup. Or chicken broth (Hühnerbrühe).
There’s a cool restaurant in Silverlake that Paolo and I went to this evening, called Diablo. We had a fantastic dinner. It was a Mexican restaurant before. California was something else before. I was a Scandinavian alien before. Whatever.
They made a popsicle of it. Not of the world but of the chicken soup. Bite in it, drink a sip and lick salt.
Wow.