The starting point of the audio walk marks the biographies of several Frankfurt artists who were persecuted by the Nazi regime and ousted from the city’s cultural life from 1933 onwards.

The photographers Nini and Carry Hess ran one of the most famous photo studios of the Weimar Republic on Börsenplatz. Hans Erl and Magda Spiegel were among the star singers of the Frankfurt Opera, and the actor Joachim Gottschalk shone in the role of the young hero at the theater. Their traces are lost in the advancing Nazi dictatorship and today we go in search of them: How did the change of power in 1933 take place at Frankfurt’s theaters? How did this affect Frankfurt’s artistic life and the fates of the artists? Which names have been forgotten today, even though they played a decisive role in shaping the 1920s? The audio walk by Kollektiv Widerhall gives the audience the opportunity to locate the artists’ stories in the city we pass through every day. It combines historical material with fictional text passages and searches for interactions with today’s city.

Credits

Production: Kollektiv Widerhall 2022
By and with: Louisa Beck, Loriana Casagrande, Jan Deck, Marlene-Sophie Haagen, Dennis Hoss, Dörthe Krohn, Marie Schwesinger
Speakers: Marlene-Sophie Haagen, Christina Geisse, Lena Schmidtke, Leon Stiehl, Melanie Straub, Wolfgang Vogler
In cooperation with: studioNAXOS
Trailer: Fanny Hagmeier & Pola Sell
Supported by:
Cultural Office of the City of Frankfurt am Main, Fonds Darstellende Künste with funds from the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, Hessian Ministry of Science and the Arts and the Foundation EVZ: Remembrance, Responsibility and Future in the funding program: local.history
With the kind support of: Schauspiel Frankfurt and Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv Wiesbaden