From 29 September to 11 October 2024, the exhibition NACHHALL by Berlin-based sound artist Tobias Euler will take place at Kleiner Wasserspeicher in Prenzlauer Berg. This project aims to commemorate the victims of National Socialist terror, which was institutionalized immediately after the end of the Weimar Republic, even in the middle of Berlin’s urban society. One of the first concentration camps was located in 1933 in a building that no longer exists on the Wasserturm site in Prenzlauer Berg.
With the disappearance of the generation of contemporary witnesses, the forms of expression of commemorative culture are changing. The use of sound art could expand conventional ways of remembering. Tobias Euler has created a sound space in the vault of the former water reservoir that invites visitors to engage in an associative dialogue with a chapter of Berlin’s history that is in danger of being forgotten.
To this end, the artist has developed an installation of digitally controlled sound objects made from fragments of accordions, an instrument that played a key role in the traditional music of various groups persecuted by the Nazis. Sequences of historical sound material can be heard, which are combined with everyday noises from the 1930s and the sound of accordion machines to create a collage of language and music. Due to the reverberation times in the vaulted architecture, sound reflections become part of the composition.
Tobias Euler studied Fine Arts at the Bauhaus University Weimar. His work operates at the interface between sculpture, music and robotics. His work centres on digitally controlled, interacting sound objects, which he arranges in space to create walk-in installations. In 2022, Tobias Euler presented his exhibition Sounds of Hyphae and Mycelia at the Parochialkirche in Berlin, funded by the BBK Neustart Kultur programme. In 2023, he received the Serious Music and Sound Art working grant from the Berlin Senate Department.
Historian Niko Rollmann is specialised in underground architecture, the history of Berlin and homelessness. His publications include volumes such as Die Stadt unter der Stadt. He is co-founder and first chairman of unter-berlin. He regularly leads groups on historical tours through Prenzlauer Berg and other parts of Berlin.
