Life and love in the shadow of the Berlin wall

When Angela Davis was arrested and imprisoned in America in 1969, the GDR (German Democratic Republic, also known as East Germany) was her greatest supporter. They organized, among other things, a massive letter-writing campaign and filed a petition demanding her freedom. Although we have been told otherwise, this brief moment in history illustrates nicely the spirit of the East Bloc country. A society where women had much more equality than in the West, both in the workplace and in the legal system—the GDR adopted, for instance, the most liberal abortion legislation in Europe.

In cinema too, women were represented in a very different light from what we know of Western films. This was a signature feature of the state-run Defa film studio from its very beginnings. Not devious femme fatales, not secretaries or mere love interests with sexuality as their only selling point, in the GDR women were seen as real people with human problems and real goals. They were given center-stage, unencumbered by cliches and cheap sentiment. Indeed, if they were in any way marked as outsiders, they were often presented as rebels, key characters who could, by their transgressive actions or by simply trying to get on with their lives, point out the contradictions of society.

In the GDR women were seen as real people with human problems and real goals

The swan song of this Frauenfilm genre was, arguably, Helke Misselwitz’s Winter Adé. With a 16mm camera perched on her shoulder, she travelled through East Germany by train and knocked out an amazing recording of the diversity of women’s experiences. From village grannies to factory workers to punks, her black and white celluloid captured their views and their situation in countless shades of grey. All these films were at once more critical, mature, and playful than what we think was even remotely possible in the GDR.

Was the East Bloc psychedelic, for instance? Certainly not in terms of its color palette! But the most valuable aspect of an LSD or mushroom experience is the realization that everything is interconnected, that we are all breathing human beings who are equal. It isn’t about getting lost in a load of drugs, which is actually closer to consumerism. Indeed, those who coined the term ‘acid communism’ defined it as the act of engaging in a vision beyond capitalism, and making it a reality. The whole idea of ‘class consciousness’ is totally acid communism.

There is something inherent in greed, and the feeling of having captured something— therefore owning it—that is antithetical to the awareness of psychedelics. In this mind- expanded realm one acknowledges that everything is non-permanent, that things and experiences are only there to be enjoyed for a while, and then passed on.

Under capitalism, the only collectivity that exists is in fashion trends—the mass purchase of products and pre-made identities. Maybe, after all the razzle dazzle and spectacle of capitalism, we can begin to formulate a different kind of glamor than we have in the West, one based more on the spark of our inner life.

The problem for us is that we’ve been indoctrinated through our Western visual culture to associate acid communism with neon-colored hippie posters. Sure, the GDR was greyer. There were no kaleidoscopic ads, the sixties’ excitement around the marketplace, which seems so tiresome today, was missing. But I like to think that what was coming to the surface in such an environment was a lot more of a person’s inner colors. GDR fashion magazines, for the record, did map the latest trends, but people were not pushed into being passive consumers—instead of ads in the back pages, they printed design patterns so that people could make the clothes themselves and invent their own variations. In that way it was a very do-it-yourself culture, quite ahead of its time.

In that way it was a very do-it-yourself culture, quite ahead of its time.

A new GDR-themed zine is coming out this month. Its starting point is Kristen Ghodsee’s exploration of Why Women have Better Sex under Socialism. Because according to a poll taken after the fall of the Berlin Wall, women in East Germany had twice as many orgasms than women in West Germany. The zine, going under the same title, pluralizes Ghodsee’s book by including my own experiences, and connecting what she says about politics to culture, and especially cinema.

Copies will be distributed for free at a series of GDR film screenings to be held at various alternative locations in Amsterdam and announced on radar[1] under Jeffrey’s Underground cinemas. Paper Jam[2], who printed my previous zine on West German cinema, are taking care of the entire print run, and The Fort van Sjakoo[3] bookstore will have some copies as soon as this wandering retrospective kicks off. All films in (East) German, with English subtitles. Stay tuned.

[1] radar.squat.net events in social centres across Europe
[2] paperjamcollective.nl printers at Nieuwland, in Amsterdam East
[3] sjakoo.nl radical bookshop, downtown, behind the Waterlooplein flea market