Wie steht es heute um die Kunst? – Ein surrealer Dialog

The scene: a retirement home with a care centre

and a ward for the mentally disturbed. Most

of them in open zones, only a few in closed

zones. Some have strange tics and habits.

Some are haunted by their nocturnal dreams,

others, like Mr B, by the obsessive idea that

art and art history have come to an end worldwide.

Only religions could save them. Mr A is

more open-minded than Mr B. But he also has

his nightmares and suffers from isolation. Both,

you could say, are addicted to their daily discussions,

which sometimes escalate into arguments

and then end in reconciliation.

It's late summer. When the sun is shining in

the afternoon, the residents of the institution can

watch from their balconies or from the café as

the two elderly men, Mr B and Mr A, set off for

their daily garden rounds around 3 pm, sitting

on their bench for a longer time.

Mr B was a heavy smoker and drinker. He is

in the process of kicking all his unhealthy habits,

with the help of therapists and doctors. Hard

work against his own body. In real life, he used

to be a teacher at a grammar school. His subjects:

German and art.

Mr A has a small moustache under his nose.

He walks a little more crooked and stooped than

Mr B. His life was well-behaved and bourgeois.

He was a good pupil and student. After graduating

from high school and studying architecture,

he decided to become a civil servant and

applied for a job with the city. He was hired without

any problems and soon became head of

the building permit office.

Every day, one of the two gentlemen, usually

Mr B, brings a small piece of paper with a quote

from an artist or philosopher to the meeting.

Their conversations oscillate between seriousness

and fun, between exaggeration and irony,

between play and pure entertainment, between

Plato and Heidegger, between Karl Valentin and

current, meaningless politicians, between TV talk

shows, adult education course topics and regulars'

table gossip. We accompany the two gentlemen

for seven days, then it's over. A slice of

time. A slice of life. A slice of reality