positHIV

Old St. Matthäus Cemetery – visible queer mourning

Café Finovo* (est.: 2006) outdoor area, Jan. 2024, alter Sankt-Matthäus-Kirchhof (cemetery), Berlin-Schöneberg. (Sculpture on loan from Scherhag GmbH. stone masonry, Berlin.)

Entrance Café Finovo, Jan. 2024.

Contact between AIDS activists and members of the Lutheran church comes about early on in the response to HIV/AIDS in Germany.¹ Despite religious leaders’ (Lutheran church leaders included) ambivalent response to the topic of HIV/AIDS particularly in connection with Queer people, parishes like the inner-city Twelve-Apostles Parish in Berlin-Schönberg become active early on in the grassroots response to the realities of living and dying with the virus.

Garden seating, Café Finovo, Jan. 2024.

Beginning in the late 1990s, AIDS activist, “Tunte” and former O-Ton Pirat Ichgola Androgyn (aka: Bernd Boßmann) and others, along with members of the Twelve-Apostles Parish make it possible for people who have died with AIDS to be laid to rest in the old St. Matthäus Cemetery (link to more comprehensive German language Wikipedia article). Since 2000 the non-profit Denk mal PositHIV e.V. has taken on the custodianship of the graves of people who died with AIDS. The original shared plot with a names plaque created in 2000 at the old St. Matthäus Cemetery was expanded in 2015, and a small monument by the artist Jorn Ebner was added in 2015.²

Bernd Boßmann opened Café Finovo in the former grounds keeper’s house of the old St. Matthäus Cemetery in Berlin-Schöneberg, in 2006 as a community space and an place for queer mourning.

Café Finovo, Jan. 2024.

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Addresses:

Café “finovo”
Alter St.-Matthäus-Kirchhof
Großgörschenstr. 12-14
10829 Berlin
Proprietor: Bernd Boßmann
http://www.cafe-finovo.de/

Denk mal positHIV e. V.
c/o Dorothea Strauß
Gierkeplatz 4
10585 Berlin
Board: Eugen Januschke, Olaf Rönitz, Dorothea Strauß
https://denk-mal-posithiv.de/

Scherhag-SteinmetzwerkstättenGmbH
Kolonnenstraße 42
10829 Berlin
Management: Tobias Eidner
https://scherhag-gmbh.de/

Cemetery contact:

Location:
Alter St.-Matthäus-Kirchhof
Großgörschenstr. 12-14
10829 Berlin
https://www.zwoelf-apostel-berlin.de/

Administration:
Zwölf-Apostel-Kirchhofsverwaltung
Kolonnenstraße 24-25
10829 Berlin
Administration: Felix Milkereit (manager), Susanne Krüger (burials), Bertram von Boxberg (public and press liaison), Andreas Schörding (grounds), Wolfgang Schindler (archivist and grave sponsorship)
https://www.zwoelf-apostel-berlin.de/

Memorial location on cemetery map:

Location of the monument for the people who died with HIV/AIDS in the old St. Matthäus Cemetery.

Sources:

1) Kaelberlah, Juliane: About Blank: Ein Ort der Trauer und des Gedenkens, On: franziskaner.net, Dated: March 02 2020, URL: https://franziskaner.net/kirche-posithiv-abschied/, Last viewed: March 10 2024.
2) Schock, Axel: KIRCHE positHIV beendet Arbeit nach 26 Jahren – Dank- und Abschiedsgottesdienst für die ökumenische Aids-Initiative, On: magazin.hiv (Gesellschaft & Culture), Dated: Oct 18 2015, URL: https://magazin.hiv/magazin/gesellschaft-kultur/ein-ort-der-trauer-und-des-gedenkens/, Last viewed: March 10 2024.

://about blank

Club collective and autonomous cultural space

The construction site at the corner of Markgrafendamm and Hauptstraße (Berlin-Rummelsburg). In the background, Autonomist Club / Space ://about blank, Markgrafendamm 24c, 10245 Berlin-Friedrichshain.

About:

The collectively run music club and cultural space ://about blank (alternative spelling “About Blank”) arose in the mid- to late 1990s as an underground club in the context of the Autonomist squatters movement,¹ opening within an official legal framework in 2010. ://about blank hosts regular event series as well as one-time cultural and solidarity events.

According to the German language Wikipedia article, ://about blank is a Techno club. Where as the term “Techno club” suggests any night spot with electronic music, as such ://about blank stands in the Left Autonomist tradition of self-organized and grass-roots “cultural spaces” that saw its Berlin heyday from the mid-1980s to the late 2010s.

The collective describes itself on its Instagram page as:

technoclub and cultural space in berlin | autonomist disco for hedonistic insurrectionalist dialectics.

– Instagram: about.blank.berlin. On: instagram.com. URL: https://www.instagram.com/about.blank.berlin/. Last viewed: 05 Nov 2023. (Translation into English by blog’s author)

The on-line platform for electronic music Resident Advisor has the following summary:

://about blank is a formerly illegal, multi-room club by Ostrkeuz S-Bahnhof in Friedrichshain. It’s a short walk from Salon Zur Wilde Renate, and like that club, it’s a lightly renovated re-purposed building with seemingly endless nooks and crannies. There are two main dance floors inside, and in the summer DJs play out in the garden (this is open in the winter too, often with a bonfire going).

The music policy is open-ended but mostly focused on house and techno, with occasional bass or disco nights. The overall atmosphere is gritty, and the parties often go well into the following afternoon or evening.

– Resident Advisor: ://about blank. On: https://ra.co (clubs > 28354). URL: https://ra.co/clubs/28354. Last viewed: 05 Nov 2023.

In spite of its standing among Berlin’s more popular clubs, ranking with 11.772 followers on Resident Advisor among Berlin’s top five clubs², ://about blank’s continuation at its current location is called into question by controversial A100 free-way extension project, while at the same time being subject to challenges arising from contemporary social, economic and cultural change such as the virtualization of social interaction, privatization / gentrification of public space, and the increasing predominance of ordo-liberal, nationalist and militarist sentiment (often referred to as the “swing to the right” – See “Rightist Populism“).

://about blank’s event schedule can be found on the ://about blank website.

1) Blomber, Viola: About Blank: Was du über den Berliner Club wissen solltest. On: quiz.de . URL: https://www.qiez.de/about-blank-techno-club-berlin/. Last viewed: 05 Nov 2023.
2) Resident Advisor: Beliebte Clubs in Berlin. On: https://ra.co . URL: https://ra.co. Last viewed: 05 Nov 2023.

Möbel Olfe

Olfs and other mythical creatures.

Entrance to the bar and community space Möbel Olfe, Reichenbacher Straße 177 in the Zentrum Kreuzberg (NZK) building, Berlin-Kreuzberg.

About:

The Möbel Olfe bar in the Zentrum Kreuzberg (NZK), Berlin-Kreuzberg, opened in 2002. The idea came about during the preliminary planning phase for a “Kreuzberg Kaufhaus” (English: Kreuzberg department store) which was to offer space for “young creative people”. The creative department store was never realized by its planners. The bar, on the other hand, is popular to this day.

The name “Möbel Olfe” is a reference to a neon sign for a furniture department store on Dresdner Straße in Kreuzberg that had gone out of business some some time before the bar first opened in 2002. The neon sign on the roof of the Kreuzberg Center (NZK) remained there long after the furniture store had gone out of business, and helped visitors to find their way to the bar through the unconventional street numbering created by the architecture of the NZK Find a bar.

The bar was initially run jointly by Richard Stein and Wolf Maack, who, according to the Berliner Zeitung¹, previously organized events and shows in Berlin clubs such as SO36 and Café Anal (opened February 1990² until circa 2000, Muskauer Str. 15, 10997 Berlin). Richard Stein is listed as the owner on the Möbel Olfe website today (Last viewed September 2023).

Möbel Olfe is open from Tuesday to Friday starting at 6:00 p.m., regularly holding so called “Soli-Events”, (solidarity events) often including a fundraiser for grassroots democratic, social and emancipatory projects.

1) Die Bar “Möbel Olfe” liegt mitten im Zentrum Kreuzberg am Kottbusser Tor – und hat das Nachtleben verändert: Der ewige Geheimtipp. Auf: berliner-zeitung.de (Berlin). Datum: 18. Okt 2023. URL: https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/die-bar-moebel-olfe-liegt-mitten-im-zentrum-kreuzberg-am-kottbusser-tor-und-hat-das-nachtleben-veraendert-der-ewige-geheimtipp-li.63702. Zuletzt gesichtet: 24. Sept 2023.
2) Würdemann, Ulrich: Familiengeschichten rastende Anal-Olfen . Auf: 2mecs.de. Datum: 03. Mai 2023. URL: https://www.2mecs.de/wp/2008/05/familiengeschichten-rastender-anal-olfen/. Zuletzt gesichtet: 25. Sept 2023.

U-Bahnhof Kottbusser Tor

On the plaza lovingly called Kotti.

View from the platform of the elevated line U1 toward the norther side of Kottbusser Tor, Berlin-Kreuzberg.

A young person on the platform of subway line U1.

Young people socializing near a typical Berlin late-night shop on Reichenberger Straße.

Very popular take-out restaurant Orient Eck seen from the entrance / exit to Kottbusser Tor subway station.

A young person with an instrument case hurrying to the subway U6 at Kottbusser Tor.

A young person posing on the stairs to the entrance / exit to Reichenberger Straße at subway station Kottbusserr Tor.

Discarded cola can, subway station Kottbusser Tor, Berlin-Kreuzberg.

About:

Kottbusser Tor is the name for a square-like street intersection and a subway station in the Berlin district of Kreuzberg (Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg district). The square and the subway station are also called “Kotti” in Berlin vernacular. It is the center of the northeastern half of Kreuzberg, the historic SO 36.*

The area is part of the Wilhelmine tenement belt that runs around the circumference of the then city limits.

As was the case with many such neighborhoods, the buildings lacked central heating, and bathrooms and toilets were often shared by multiple flats. What could be salvaged after the Bombing of Berlin was scheduled to be razed to make way for plans to build an “automotive city” (See planned but never completed segment Autobahn 106).

An interim use as housing for migrant workers, so called “Gastarbeiter” (English, literally: guest workers) was deemed appropriate until such time as the neighborhood was remodeled according to the Athens Charter zeitgeist, at which point it was presumed (and initially contractually stipulated) that the primarily Northern Mediterranean migrant workers would have returned to their countries of origin.

In the 1970s and 1980s Kreuzberg “SO 36” was the heart of the West-Berlin political dissent symbolized by the “Hausbesetzer” (English: Squatters) movement.

Over the past decade or two the neighborhood has become a fashionable place to live. This has been accompanied by the seemingly unavoidable consequences.

* Wikipedia: Kottbusser Tor. On: wikipedia.org (Kottbusser_Tor). URL: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kottbusser_Tor. Last viewed: Sept 20 2023.
(Translation into English by the photographer)

Café Kotti

owned and operated by social worker, and activist Ercan Yaşaroğlu since 2009

staircase to the first above ground floor and Café Kotti

view from the bridge over Adalbertstraße

Afternoon customers at Café Kotti

Entrance Café Kotti

Anti-discrimination statement in English, German and Turkish at Café Kotti

Extra room at Café Kotti

Hand decorated ceiling tiles at café Kotti

Smiling wait staff and hand decorated ceiling tiles at Café Kotti

About:

Owner Ercan Yaşaroğlu came to Germany in 1982 fleeing first political persecution under the military junta in Turkey, and then once more, this time from war in Lebanon.

In 2009, Yaşaroğlu took over Café Kotti from the previous owners with whom he had been closely acquainted.

Yaşaroğlu turned the locality into community oriented bar and café with an emphasis on youth work, neighborhood outreach, and anti-discrimination.

– Zauner, David: Kreuzbergs letzter Optimist – Der Sozialarbeiter, Café-Betreiber und Aktivist Ercan Yaşaroğlu schaut auf viele Jahre am Kottbusser Tor. On: nd-aktuell.de (Berlin > Berliner Keiz-Größen. Dated: April 08 2022. URL: https://www.nd-aktuell.de/artikel/1162868.berliner-kiez-groesse-kreuzbergs-letzter-optimist.html. Last viewed: Sept 11 2023.

Address:

Café Kotti
Adalbertstraße 96
10999 Berlin-Kreuzberg
Germany

Open: from afternoons until late at night