"In Altona, there was a factory. Many a man went there as a philistine and came back as a human being," cabaret artist Hans Scheibner once rhymed. He means the factory in Hamburg. Opened in June 1971 in a former machine and munitions factory, it is the first culture and communication center in Germany. "Culture for everyone" is the motto of the factory. The aim is to promote creativity, communication, initiative and self-confidence. The cultural center for child and youth work organizes readings, discussions, theater and of course live music. Big names from a wide variety of music genres have performed on the concert stage:from AC/DC to Miles Davis and Nina Simone to John Zorn.
Social work and large cultural program
Hamburg's beacon of alternative culture in the 1970s:the Fabrik culture project in the Altona district.The selection of the offer in the factory is large. During the day it is a meeting point for children and young people from the area. Here you can get advice and help with problems and suggestions for leisure activities such as painting, handicrafts, handicrafts, cooking, baking as well as sports and the Internet. Homework supervision is offered twice a week. In addition, there is a "farm" on an area directly behind the cultural center, which is intended to convey life in nature to the city children during the summer months. In the theater workshop, contemporary plays on themes such as life, love and growing up are developed by children and young people under supervision. Adults and young people can devote themselves to pottery, get involved in the photo group or in the recording studio. All of this is free. In the evenings, theater, readings, discussions and live concerts are on the programme.
Art and culture for everyone
This is what the factory used to look like. The industrial flair was retained even after the conversion to a cultural center.Flashback:Two years after Woodstock, the painter Horst Dietrich and the architect Friedhelm Zeuner want to implement a utopia. Both of them are bothered by the fact that "art is an elitist affair". Culture not only for those who wear ties and collars, but for those who "haven't come up well", that's what Dietrich, who was born in Altona, wants. Dietrich and Zeuner took over a vacant clinker building from 1830 in the heart of Ottensen for a hereditary lease of 3,200 marks a month. Zeuner was responsible for the conversion of the industrial hall - he later received the Hamburg Senate's architecture prize for it. There is a lot of poverty and crime in the working-class district, which is in need of rehabilitation. But Dietrich and Zeuner want to take care of street children and rockers in particular. On June 25, 1971, the time had come:the factory opened.
Cell of Communication
In September 1971, Mikis Theodorakis comes to the factory. The Greek composer railed against the military junta in his home country. The concert has a signal effect. Hamburgers are flocking to the alternative stronghold. Punks, rockers, hippies and people in ties celebrate in rare harmony. Juvenile delinquency in the district is falling. In 1973, the federal government honored the factory for its exemplary implementation of the new understanding of culture and its communication. Cultural centers are springing up all over Germany based on the model of the factory.
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- Part 1:Culture not just for those who wear ties and collars
- Part 2:Difficult years and money worries