We Are All Staying

Berlin's street art and graffiti scene broadcasts endless messages for passerby to potentially appreciate, perhaps contemplate, or completely ignore. I’ve tried my best to practice attentiveness, even though to my untrained, foreigner's eye the sometimes remains elusive. The following work of street art, for example, has given me plenty to think about:

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I found this wall in the Berlin neighborhood Kreuzberg near Kottbusser Tur, which Berliners call Kotti. Kotti and Kreuzberg overall serve as a hub for youth and creative culture in Berlin-- by day and especially by night. Tourist info likes to call it "trendy." Originally located in an unappealing location right near the Berlin Wall, Turkish migrants established communities in Kreuzberg starting mostly in the 1960s, and these communities continue to influence the culture of the neighborhood. However, in more recent years—starting with the fall of the Wall and accelerating in the last decade—gentrification has swept through Kotti, both in the form of government and corporate ventures and private investment from “yuppie” and “creative class” renters. To many, Kotti is a hip, thriving, fascinating world resulting from a diverse and integrated community. To others, it is a battleground of rent wars, displacement, and the fight for the “right to the city.”

I can’t pretend to understand the origin of all the elements at play in the piece, but I do understand “Wir Blieben Alle.” "Kotti & Co," a permanent, ongoing tenant's rights organization uses this phrases as a slogan. It translates to “We Are All Staying,” and represents the powerful practice of physically taking up space to assert a claim. Some of the other messages include “Stop Racism,”  “Affordable Rent” and “Social City.”

A quick Google search provides more context. According to Berlin street artist Poet73’s blog, “the City of Berlin and the Housing Company” approached him to create this mural, located on Admiral Street (which explains ADMIRAL appearing in block letters across the front). He worked with 10 young Admiralstrasse residents to create a “classical Graffiti wall representing their street and their names.”

Based on a perusal of the blog, Poet makes art both officially and through “graffiti bombing.” Generally, Poet’s art does not expressly depict political messages (although art can never really be apolitical). Interestingly, the City of Berlin specifically called for this street art-- it merely looks like graffiti. And, paradoxically, it depicts messages from protest movements fighting the same City of Berlin that requested it.

As a casual passerby, I enjoyed this mural and I like the idea of local young people creating it. However, I could not help but feel critical in light of the content of my courses this semester. One of my professors has cautioned against this sort of art. Rather than truly disrupting the status quo, it operates from within the confines of the powers that be. The artists and creative young people get to feel like they are making a statement, while the City of Berlin gets a vibrant street corner to add to their marketing scheme of Berlin as a hotbed of alternative, lively and diverse culture—in turn, attracting gentrifiers who contribute to the issues of displacement and rent increases in the first place.

The mural itself isn’t the full story, though. Upon closer inspection, I noticed “Free Gaza” and “Freiheit für Palastina” ("Freedom for Palestine") etched on the surrounding facades. Different community members presumably added these later, their messages unsanctioned by the broader project but, of course, not unrelated.

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The Israeli-Palestinian conflict poses divisive, emotional and excruciatingly difficult questions anywhere in the world. People argue about whether this conflict is, at its core, religious—but what is undeniable is that religion is a major factor. And the two religions involved, Judaism and Islam, hold great weight in the formation of modern German identity.

To see the phrase “Free Gaza” on a Berlin Street affected me more than I would have expected. To be honest, it scared and angered me. I too believe in autonomy for the Palestinian people and the urgent necessity of Palestinian Statehood. I understand the importance of international pressure on the Israeli government to end the occupation of Palestinian lands. In fact, it is my Jewish values that command me to support those whose voices are perhaps silenced or distorted, to welcome the stranger, to treat all people as reflections of the divine. 

At the same time, I fear an erasure of nuance that vilifies the State of Israel-- a tiny, beautiful, beacon of survival and freedom, which is all too often held to unreasonable standards as it seeks to safeguard itself against staggering security threats. I am anxiously aware of surging waves of anti-Semitism, especially in Europe, and their undeniable connection to anti-Israel sentiment.

So to see these words spelled out in plain sight in a country that only decades ago systematically murdered its Jews unsettled me. However, I reminded myself that feeling upset should be a motivation to try to understand.

Certainly without further research it is impossible to know whether or not Turkish migrant influence in the community had anything to do with the slogan, irresponsible to equate migration with global Islam and dangerous to suggest pan-Arab sentiment. I think a valid approach, though, is to place the graffiti in the context of a community influenced by a history of Muslim migrants who have experienced marginalization. 

And finally, I cannot ignore the parallel between the slogan in the mural, “We Are All Staying,” and a sentiment expressing support for the Palestinian people and their contested land. I can point out the erasure of nuance, and the potentially dangerous consequences for Jews worldwide, but the parallel remains. The mural and surrounding graffiti tell a story, and all these factors play a role.