Beton Berlin 32, Constantin Hartenstein: (Unser) Leben ((our) life)

Starting from Walter Womacka's mosaic ›Unser Leben‹ from 1964 at the Haus des Lehrers, Beton Berlin and Constantin Hartenstein present a site-specific performance in public space. Performers initially recreate individual figures and groups from the mosaics with precision. As the performance unfolds, the original composition gradually dissolves: bodies leave their positions, roles shift, and new relationships emerge. Heroic gestures lose their certainty, while images of the family transform into temporary communities and chosen queer kinships.

Tractors and Trabants—or their representations—evoke the promise of a future once imagined. Songs emerging from them recall different lived realities, while Smalltown Boy is performed live. Moving between tableau vivant, choreographed sculpture and public performance, the work offers a new reading of the mural. It asks whose stories, bodies and ways of living are represented in public space—and whose remain absent.