Robert Paris

Berlin, the German capital again, a few years after the fall of the Wall. The city in upheaval is also changing the lives of its inhabitants. A young photographer experiences these changes as a rupture, he looks into an unclear, unsettling future and increasingly feels like a stranger in his old city. He and his friends from the generation of the children of the Wall try to find a new identity without losing the old one. Young artists who fail the profitability test of the market economy. In his search, Robert Paris ends up far away, in India. Back in Berlin, he started developing photos again - the first in years...

Le film fait un voyage dans le sauvage univers parallèle de la mode et de l’art de la survie à Berlin-Est. Il s’agissait d’un monde fantastique au beau milieu du quotidien restrictif de la RDA. On pouvait n’en faire qu’à sa tête, se singulariser et provoquer. Le signe de reconnaissance essentiel du milieu était le style personnel car à l’époque de la RDA, on ne pouvait pas l’ache- ter. Il fallait bricoler soi-même son image individuelle dans le monde paral- lèle. Le film raconte les désirs, les passions et les rêves qui furent expérimen- tés, vécus et mis en scène à l’ombre du Mur.

Sven Marquardt might be the most famous bouncer worldwide. But beside standing in front of the legendary techno club Berghain in Berlin, he is also a well-known and skilled photographer. Long before the Berlin Wall came down, Marquardt portrayed the subcultural East-Berlin scene. His black and white photography illustrates it as voluptuous, laid-back, dirty and existential. Even if shot by daylight, his work is permeated by darkness, ecstasy and night.