What are you working on at the moment—what excites or challenges you about it?
To remember that there is still something else in the world besides ordinariness.
Do you have a daily ritual that inspires you or helps you find structure?
I follow Thomas Mann’s routine: »Correspondence in the morning. Aspirin in the afternoon.«
What music helps you focus or get back into a creative flow?
The album ›Through The Looking Glass‹ by the Japanese percussionist Midori Takada from 1983.
Is there a book that’s changed the way you see things, and why would you recommend it?
Anything by Thomas Bernhard and Fanny Howe—because he is wrong about everything and she is right about everything (of course).
If you could have any artwork in your home, what would it be?
The painting ›The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb‹ (1521/22) by Hans Holbein the Younger. But I’m even happier that it is accessible to the public at Kunstmuseum Basel.
What exhibition space in Berlin inspires you?
On the one hand, Doom Spa—a sky bar, a sauna, an exhibition space—high up on Lietzenburger Straße 4, and on the other, Scheusal in Moabit, run by my friends Rosa and Sebastian.
Is there an object you keep close that reflects part of your identity?
A putti bowl by Wilhelm Süs from around 1900—wildly impractical and perhaps beautiful precisely because of that.
What keeps you going when doubt creeps in?
Then I simply think of Kurt Vonnegut’s graffiti in Deadeye Dick (1982):
»To be is to do«—Socrates
»To do is to be«—Jean-Paul Sartre
»Do be do be do«—Sinatra
And just like that, things feel okay again.
If you could have a conversation with anyone, who would it be and what would you talk about?
I’d very much like to talk with Hildegard of Bingen about herbs and men.
What’s something you look forward to when the workday ends?
Going for a walk through the Hansaviertel and Tiergarten with Simon.