Warsaw...

What can I say about Warsaw? It is gray in December. But at least I met my friends, Frau - my best friend, and her boyfriend and the new dog - cool beagle Lala. I also met Przemek, the chief editor of Le Monde Diplomatique Polska, who brought me 2 issues of LMD with my drawings printed (October and December 2006!). I must say that I am happy to publish my drawings there because I find the LMD very cool - they have great authors and very interesting articles. I recommend!

Being busy

I was really busy for the last days. First of all I started a new job, as an art (sort-of-thing) trainer for young people in Kreuzberg. Not an easy job but it is ok. I just thought it would be better paid. Typical Berlin-job-situation.

On Dec. 7th I went to see the Eurosolar Prize event somewhere in Berlin Mitte. As I came 1 hour later to avoid boring speaches it appeared I still had to wait 1 more hour for the food and drinks (buffet). But it was worth it. Experimental shushi and not-the-best-wine-in-the-world, but hey, as the Germans say: "immer hin!" (better than nothing). And all the awarded projects are very interesting so take a look here http://www.eurosolar.org/new/en/esp_2006.html

Another cool event took place actually in Warsaw. I was invited with a lecture to a conference "Bramy Kraju" (The gates of the country, rough translation) in Sheraton Hotel (!) on Dec. 14th. The conference was very interesting. And it is great that such events take place in Poland, where specialists and public can discuss social issues of cities. Small conference, but fine. It was organised by Foundation Bramy Kraju and AMS (an outdoor advertising company based in Warsaw, although I remember when at the beginning, many years ago, AMS was still in Poznan). Along with the conference there was also an award celebration for a poster competition in Fabryka Koneser in Praga district in Warsaw. All I can say that buffets, both in Sheraton and Koneser, were great! All possible alcohol and foooood... that is what I call a good conference.


My lecture "Berlin, poor but sexy" (quote from Klaus Wowereit) was about the revitalisation of Berlin and about social imputs in city's image. I am pasting my summary below as a comment. It is in Polish.

Death Instinct

"L'instinct de mort" (Death Instinct) is the title of the autobiography of Jacques Mesrine, the French "Public Enemy n°1". Wikipedia says: Mesrine made burglaries, jewelry shop and bank robberies, kidnappings and arms smuggling. He also killed many people, including noncooperative pimps – he boasted about 39 murders in total. He was good at disguising himself, earning him a nickname of "The Man of a Hundred faces". Some claim that the French right-wing terrorist group OAS supplied him with false ID papers. Now I say: But on the other hand, he was a romantic figure, beloved by the press and media. I would say, Mesrine and his "Belle Italienne" were sort of archetypes for Bonnie and Clyde or Mickey and Mallory Knox. I didn't read the book yet, I just ordered it online. But last night we went to Kino Blow up where our friend Olli Huebel organised a staged reading of "der Todestrieb" with live music. It was very good: 2 hours of great music, good reading (I didn't even fell sleep - and the reading was in german!) and a bit of ordinary theatre. Ok. But the music and atmosphere were really great!

This is the flyer for the event


And this is Jacques Mesrine, the cool guy.