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Urban Underground

A new environment of tolerance and multiculturalism coupled with surging creativity has spawned a remarkably innovative subculture in Germany's big cities over the last decade. Especially in music, theater and design, young people are finding new and original means of artistic expression. Berlin above all has become famous for its urbanity and agglomeration of artists and trendsetters. But other cities such as Hamburg, Cologne, Leipzig and Munich have also become breeding grounds for artistic creativity. Germany’s decentralized federal structure contributes to the broad distribution of cultural and creative talent. Because the Federal Republic has never had a single cultural capital like Paris, London or New York, arts of all kinds have always thrived in scattered centers, some of which are described here.

Hamburg
Berlin
Cologne
Leipzig
Munich

Hamburg

Hamburg, which boasts the largest concentration of media in Germany, is home to a scene strongly influenced by young hipsters working for big publishers such as Gruner+Jahr, Axel Springer and Bauer, television companies like NDR and Studio Hamburg and advertising agencies such as the leading German agencies Jung von Matt, Springer & Jacoby or Scholz & Friends and branches of the international agencies Lowe Lintas or Young and Rubicam. Since Hamburg has been a port of international trade for centuries, tolerance and open-mindedness are among its residents’ most notable traits. Thus, it comes as little surprise that music, film and fashion are the focal points of life there. In the past decade, the city has spawned Germany’s hottest hip-hop bands, such as Fettes Brot, Absolute Beginner and Eimsbusch. Fatih Akin, a German-Turkish filmmaker, produces his work here. An impressive selection of fresh fashion labels like Hotel, 0190 and Mägde und Knechte as well as established brands such as Jil Sander do very well in Hamburg.

The city is also home to two of the most influential theaters in Germany: the Schauspielhaus and the Thalia Theater. These stages serve as vital venues for up-and-coming German and international authors and facilitate experimental approaches to theater.

The café crowd hangs out in neighborhoods like the Schanzenviertel, Eimsbüttel, Altona and St. Pauli, where they are most likely to be spotted sipping a café latte at a Portuguese bakery or dining out in the booming restaurant, bar and club district, at places such as the Mandalay Bar, Better Days Project or Golden Pudel Club. On the streets of these districts, close to Hamburg’s (in)famous red-light district, visitors are as likely to hear English, Turkish or Portuguese being spoken as German. Local residents run the gamut from artists to media executives, families to anarchists and eco-warriors. This mixture creates an atmosphere conducive to the creation of new ideas that makes Hamburg the "city with the most vivid urban youth culture in Germany," in the words of German hipster magazine Musicscene.

Links:
Map of Hamburg

Media:
Gruner+Jahr
Axel Springer Verlag
Heinrich Bauer Verlag (in German only)
Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR) (in German only)
Studio Hamburg
Jung von Matt (in German only)
Scholz & Friends
Springer & Jacoby
Lowe Lintas
Young and Rubicam

Music (in German only):
Fettes Brot
Absolute Beginner
Eimsbusch

Film:
Fatih Akin

Fashion Labels:
Hotel
Mägde und Knechte
Jil Sander (in German only)

Theaters: (in German only)
Thalia Theater
Schauspielhaus

Venues:
Better Days Project
Golden Pudel Club
Reeperbahn (in German only)

Berlin

Certainly no other city in Germany and perhaps all of Europe has undergone as profound, complete and swift a transformation as has this once-divided city over the past decade. Since the fall of the Wall in 1989 some US$500 billion have been pumped into rebuilding Berlin, which became the German capital in 1999. Some of the world's most influential architects, such as Daniel Libeskind and Sir Norman Forster, have left their imprints on new city landmarks such as the revolutionized parliament building and the new Jewish Museum. Notable shifts are also noticeable in the city’s cultural landscape: International and multiethnic diversity are a now its hallmarks, attracting creative types from all over the world. Their influences keep Berlin in constant flux and make it one of the most avant-garde cities in Europe. Even today, the zeitgeist of the “golden twenties” is palpable in Berlin’s cultural scene. The capital is home to no less than three opera houses, 31 theaters, 29 cabarets and some 130 bars – just to name the mainstream locations. Schaubühne and Volksbühne, the city’s two most important theaters, played a key role in the creation of Germany's theater revival in the 1990s, with outstanding performances under the direction of Claus Peymann, Albert Ostermaier and Frank Castorf. Each year since the early 1990s, the Love Parade, the world’s biggest techno rave, has streamed through Berlin, bringing more than one million young people from all over the globe to each gathering.

While major tourist attractions like the Brandenburg Gate, Reichtagsgebäude (Parliament Building), Unter den Linden street and Museum Island are located in the Mitte, Kreuzberg and Schöneberg districts, fascinating, lesser-known districts await discovery in Prenzlauer Berg and Friedrichshain in the eastern part of the city. In the 1970s, Kreuzberg, which then directly abutted the Wall, was a hangout for an unusual mix of left-wing punks, anarchists and Turkish immigrants (about one-third of Kreuzberg’s population is Turkish, and Berlin is home to the biggest Turkish community outside Turkey). In the 1990s, gentrification began to alter this picture, as old factory buildings were converted into lofts and “new economy” enterprises revived crumbling neighborhoods. The area’s self-regulating communities and thriving counterculture preserve its alternative atmosphere. The popularity of Friedrichshain and Prenzlauer Berg is due mainly to the cheap rents available for spacious flats in those neighborhoods’ splendid but long-neglected fin-de-siècle houses, which have lured flocks of students and artists to the area. These districts are now home to hip newcomers and long-term residents – a mix that spawns some tensions, but also releases remarkable creative energies. The celebrated “girl group” Chicks on Speed, originally founded as a punk band but now also well known for its fashion design and art, lives here. Near Mitte, at Linienstraße and Auguststraße, Berlin's answer to New York City's artsy Chelsea district, are the city's most innovative art galleries, foremost among them Kunst-Werke or Galerie Christian Nagel. It was in this area that underground bars and clubs opened in the early 1990s and quickly became legendary — 103, Cookies, Tresor, WMF and the Tacheles bar are some of the most famous.

Links:
Map:

Architecture:
Jüdisches Museum
Reichstagskuppel
Reichstagskuppel(1)
Kanzleramt (in German only)

Theaters:
Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz (in German only)
Volksbühne Ost

Music:
Love Parade

Neighborhoods:
Kreuzberg / Friedrichshain (in German only)
Prenzlauer Berg (in German only)
Mitte (Brandenburger Tor, Reichstag, Unter den Linden, Museums)

Art:
Chicks on Speed
Kunst-Werke
Art in Berlin (in German only)

Venues:
Tresor
WMF
Tacheles

Cologne

Two of Köln’s (Cologne) biggest attractions are alliterative: Karneval (carnival) and Kunst (art). Every year in February, the city celebrates carnival as a week-long street-festival with colorful parades, outlandish costumes and live music. The city is one of Germany’s carnival capitals and its inhabitants boast that only Rio de Janeiro does it better. Cologne’s year-round attraction has always been its vivid art scene. In the 1980s this was marvelously enriched by the opening of the Ludwigsmuseum, a striking building on the Rhine that houses collector Peter Ludwig’s extensive collection of modern and contemporary art.

The museum is known as Cologne’s “art factory” and its presence has drawn many artists and gallery owners to the city, painter Gerhard Richter foremost among them. It therefore comes as little surprise that Cologne is not only the home of 45 art museums and more than 100 galleries, most famously Galerie Karsten Greve, the Kölnischer Kunstverein and Galerie 68 Elf. The city also hosts the "Art Cologne," one of Europe's most important international contemporary art fairs.

Cologne is also one of Germany's major media cities, home to television stations WDR, RTL, VOX and VIVA, with a new “media park,” which houses several broadcasting stations, restaurants and shops and serves as a magnet for eager young media professionals. Employees of VIVA, Germany’s MTV (also based in the media park), are easy to spot on the streets with their funky, fashion-forward styles. It was VIVA that brought the "PopKomm", the world's biggest pop music fair, to Cologne.

Cologne’s residents are known to enjoy any social gathering involving Kölsch, the local lager. The “Belgian Quarter,” with its appealing mix of retro and Wilheminian architecture, is enlivened by the Friesenstraße, a must for bar-hoppers. While the old town pleases with its narrow cobblestone streets, and the famous cathedral and parks along the Rhine, the Ehrenfeld neighborhoods ethnic diversity fascinates. Fashionable furniture shops, avant-garde florists, nightclubs and ethnic eateries make this area ripe for cultural discovery.

Links:
Map

Art:
Galleries in Cologne
Muesums in Cologne
Art Cologne

Media:
WDR (in German only)
RTL (in German only)
VOX (in German only)
VIVA
PopKomm

Neighborhoods:
All Neighborhoods in Cologne (in German only)
Ehrenfeld (in Greman only)
Altstadt south (in German only)

Venues:
Tiefenrausch (in German only)
Bar guide Cologne (in German only)

Leipzig

In the 1990s, marketers came up with the slogan “Leipzig kommt” (Leipzig is coming) for this eastern German city. Today, these words seem to have been a self-fulfilling prophecy: Leipzig and its surroundings form one of the fastest-growing economic regions in Europe, mostly thanks to the city’s trade fair, which hosts more than 30 fairs of all kinds each year and attracts roughly 1.4 million visitors. What makes Leipzig so interesting to those who flock to it and to those who live there is its mix of modernism and tradition, which today finds expression in a blend of its rigid East German past and current receptiveness to new influences.

In 1989, it was here that, after services were held in the Nikolaikirche (Church of St. Nicholas), the first demonstrations were held. They led to the events that triggered the fall of the Wall. This gothic church is still very popular, although now most visitors come to hear music performed on its tremendous organ, built in 1858-1862. Music is Leipzig’s leitmotiv: The city is the birthplace of composer Johann Sebastian Bach and home to the world-famous Thomanerchor, which Bach himself once led. The Gewandhausorchester, one of the top orchestras in the world, was conducted by Kurt Masur for many years, before he left to take up his baton at the New York Philharmonic.

The Gewandhaus’ home is worth a visit for the architecture alone: Opened in 1981, it is a splendid example of East German modernist design. However, Leipzig’s performing arts scene is notable, too: Schaubühne Lindenfels, Schauspiel and Neue Szene are the city’s three splashy theaters, offering plenty of space for experimental theater. In fact, both houses are influential enough to lend their names to an entire neighborhood, the Schauspielviertel, the city's theater district, which is also home to most of Leipzig’s bars and clubs. Places such as Maga Pon, a laundromat-cum-bar, and Varadero, Germany's first and fully authentic Cuban restaurant – right down to the socialist-style architecture – stand side by side on Gottschedstraße and Barfußgässchen. This eclectic mixture makes Leipzig the ideal city to host Europe’s biggest bar festival, the Honky Tonk, which attracts hundreds of bands and shows, and fills the streets and venues such as Werk II and Conne Island.

Links:

Map

Music:
Nikolaikirche
Johann Sebastian Bach
Thomanerchor (in German only)
Gewandhausorchester

Theater:
Schaubühne Lindenfels (in German only)
Schauspiel (in German only)

Venues:
Bars and Cafés in Leipzig
Varadero (in German only)
Werk II (in German only)
Conne Island (in German only)

Munich

Over the past decade, the Bavarian capital has developed a lifestyle that blends tradition with technology, best and most frequently summed up as “laptops and lederhosen.” The city also enjoys a reputation for being a playground for the wealthy and glamorous — whether old money or nouveau riche, Munich offers them ample opportunity to spend and show off. Whether it be cruising through the “villa quarter” of Bogenhausen in a Mercedes, strolling in Prada-clad feet through the Germany's largest city park, the Englischer Garten, browsing for new finery at the luxury shops that line Munich’s Rodeo Drive, Maximillian Straße, or dancing the night away at the high-society disco, P1, there is always something to amuse the schicki-micki, as the self-consciously fashionable are known there.

On the other side, Munich is also the home of the ur-traditional Oktoberfest and beer gardens.
Munich is also famous for its flourishing film and art scenes: The Alte Pinakothek houses one of the most famous collections of Old Masters in Europe, including German painters Dürer and Cranach: the Lenbachhaus displays expressionist works, most famously of the "Blue Rider" movement, in a converted villa nearby. In the heart of the downtown commercial district, the Hypo-Kulturstiftung exhibits classic modernism in a recently renovated structure planned and realized by the architects of the Tate Modern in London. Underground art thrives at the Aktionsforum Praterinsel, a community of 22 artists who live on a river island, organize various exhibitions and consider their lives an ongoing happening. Major film companies like Bavaria-Film and the Arri Media Group have their studios here, too. The city’s movie house offerings are many and varied, from the smart duoplex Cinema, where English language films are shown in the original, to the Film-museum and Werkstattkino, where art house productions, independent films and B-movies are screened.

Creative types find respite from this cultural hubbub in neighborhoods like Haidhausen and the Glockenbachviertel, where many bars and restaurants around Pariser Platz and an adjacent sculpture park or lounges such Café Wiener Platz, Mezzo or Milch und Bar offer sanctuary. Here, the rest of Munich seems like a world away, although it is just a few steps from the tourist-thronged Marienplatz or Viktualienmarkt, where historic clock towers and culinary delicacies beckon.