Archiv der Jugendkulturen
Archive Spotlight
Our new series Archive Spotlights features unique and interesting objects from some of our favourite archives, museums and libraries.
Berlin’s Archiv der Jugendkulturen has been on our radar for a while, it’s the only other archive we know of devoted to collecting the histories and stories of popular culture relating to youth and subcultures. Their archive and library in Berlin is the home of a collection used for exhibitions and education as well as preservation. Going since 1997 this important collection will enable future generations to fill in gaps of knowledge and understanding about how cultures has evolved over time. As the Berlin Archiv puts it: ‘State institutions barely collect these histories of resistance which makes self-organized archives like ours unique.’
Daniel chose to present this climbing tool, which looks like a swing, used by Pixação artists from Sao Paolo to lower themselves down from the roofs of high-rise buildings and paint them from top to bottom. Pixação is a special kind of graffiti from Brazil, mostly monochrome cryptic signs that are illegally sprayed or painted in breathtaking climbing actions and have long since left their mark on the cityscape.
Interview by Esta Maffrett | Cover Photo by Katrin Windhorst | 15.09.23
Could you say a bit about what we can find in your archive and how you use it?
We began as advocating for youth and the context of young people's lives and we have moved more towards becoming an archive for the cultural scenes and subcultures that can also stay with people as they grow up. The scenes have been growing up themselves so our focus on youth isn’t so central anymore. We are a cultural archive for scenes of popular culture that have often gone global and become a part of the cultural landscape in general. They are very influential and have reached all parts of our society.
Modern pop culture arrived in Germany in the mid 50s with the arrival of rock and roll, people were rebelling against the post war nationalist German culture by listening to music from the US and Britain or by watching Hollywood movies and so on. So it was very important for young people in Germany to get access to these new cultural areas, new music, new fashion, ideas about lifestyle.
What is the oldest object in your collection?
We have some British music magazines from the 30s, the magazine is called Gramophone and still exists, it’s a classical music magazine. This is very interesting because you find classified ads inside, people looking for records or selling records, kind of a fan magazine. We also have some student magazines that are older, I think we have one from the late 19th century but we have had to put them in storage.
When it comes to Germany, I think our oldest magazines are from the mid 50s, mainstream pop culture magazines for young people and also early science fiction fanzines.
How do you choose the categorizing and ordering of your archive?
Always by subcultures. It’s a very superficial way to solve it and sometimes it really doesn’t work - it would be great to re-think some categories but it’s a lot of work. The biggest categories are metal, punk, graffiti, techno, hip-hop, skinheads, soccer fans, science fiction fans. And so it makes sense to order by scenes.
When did your chosen object come into your belonging at the archive?
The Galerie Neurotitan in Berlin holds exhibitions from graffiti scenes and other subcultural artists. Between 2018-2019 They hosted the exhibition Habitat Happy - 300m², cozy, short term about the Pixação artists from São Paulo and Fabio Vieira and Bruno Rodrigues from Collectivo Ardepixo left us this swing as a gift to people from the Berlin scene. It’s part of a collection that is under the banner of ‘Reclaim Your City’. We have a book that was made by people from the graffiti scene, from alternative techno club scenes and festival scenes but also from social movements. They all connect the right to the city movement. The Berlin artists work with the artists from Sao Paulo who visited and have copied their style so they connect internationally to bring their graffiti style to the center of Berlin.
So this object symbolizes cultural transfer and the transfer of a certain practice. There is the transfer of graffiti but also I would say mindset because this is strongly connected to social movement, the right too the city protests that relates globally to these artists. They’re not all necessarily political but some of them are and they’re working together on murals for social service projects like housing and health. They will do huge murals on former squatted buildings that say ‘keep your hands off our homes’. Stuff like that to protest against gentrification and investors who are trying to get rid of the people who live in alternative projects.
There is a long distance between Brazil and Germany with very different backgrounds but they still have a very strong connection and similarities. It’s not only these two countries, these artists are travelling, they are active in Greece, India, Mexico and so on.