Shaping the Past: How do we interpret the past on screen?

In the framework of STP-on-Demand the Goethe Pop Ups Kansas City and Houston present Oliver Hardt's documentary Black Deutschland (2006/2020).

In Oliver Hardt’s newly remastered documentary Black Deutschland, Berlin-based writer Darius James beautifully asserts, “Black people come from everywhere. And they are everywhere.” This same affirmation is reiterated across the Atlantic in the works of Kansas City and Houston artists responding to Shaping the Past fellow Alisha B. Wormsley’s powerful statement “There Are Black People in the Future.”

At the time of its release in 2006, Black Deutschland was considered the first cinematic exploration of Black life in Germany—but, it hasn’t been the last. After watching, we invite you to engage with further works by Black creatives in Germany, including Natasha A. Kelly’s Milli’s Awakening (2018), Mo Asumang’s Roots Germania (2007), Branwen Okpako’s Valley of the Innocent (2003), and Ines Johnson-Spain’s Becoming Black (2020), to name a few.

Black Deutschland
Germany, 2006/2020 (HD Remaster), 52 min.
Director: Oliver Hardt
Languages: German, English
Subtitles: English, Spanish, French, German

The documentary Black Deutschland is an intimate study about the thoughts and feelings of a not-so-small minority, about Black Germans and Black people in Germany. Director Oliver Hardt portrays cultural workers, who, in an emotional, yet reflective and humorous way, give the viewer an idea of what it means to live as a non-white person in a society that defines itself as "white."

In open, friendly conversations, the interviewees provide information about their images of others and of themselves, about prejudices, about a deeply-rooted self-confidence, but also about their fears and uncertainties.

Black Deutschland was awarded silver at the 2006 World Media Festival in Hamburg, and was nominated for the Hessian Film Award.

About the Filmmaker

Oliver Hardt is a director and filmmaker based in Frankfurt am Main. His multidisciplinary practice ranges from writing, producing, and directing award-winning documentaries and high-end corporate films, to creating large-scale video installations for exhibitions and live-shows. In his documentaries, Hardt frequently addresses Black history and culture with a strong emphasis on architecture, design and contemporary art. His work has been featured at international film festivals. As a lecturer on film and time-based media, Hardt has held seminars and been a guest lecturer at the Academy of Visual Arts in Frankfurt, the Bauhaus University in Weimar, and the Zurich University of the Arts, among others.
In 2021, he will be artist-in-residence at Vila Sul/Goethe Institute in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil.

This virtual screening is part of the Goethe-Institut North America and its Goethe Pop Ups’ film series STP-on-Demand, which explores ways in which we cinematically shape, interrogate, and rethink relationships between history and memory. Shaping the Past is a partnership of the Goethe-Institut, Monument Lab, and the Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (Federal Agency for Civic Education). The project connects to the activist and artistic work of local, national, and transnational movements as a reflection of memory culture and discusses new perspectives on forms of memory.

Image: © Signature Film