DA SWAMP used the 48 Stunden Neukölln context to bring drawings, bodies, flash tattoos, objects and exchange into a temporary cultural world.
The festival gave the project its public life
DA SWAMP was not simply an exhibition scheduled during 48 Stunden Neukölln. The festival gave it a public condition. People moved through Neukölln, found rooms, followed fragments and decided how long to stay.
I used Berlin’s swamp as a way to speak about the cultural layer beneath the official city: the people, spaces, small exchanges and strange forms that make a neighbourhood feel alive before anyone turns it into a clean cultural proposition.
A room made from bodies and objects
DA SWAMP brought together Sketchy Shona, Countercult, Niamh-Erin Cusack and ohhi_uisce in a temporary world of drawings, moving sketches, flash tattoos, objects, bodies and the room itself. It was not a neat sequence of isolated works. People could enter it and alter it simply by being there.
The chair, bottle, radio, Späti reference, Fernsehturm and tattoo sheet are part of the record. They are not props added to make an installation look busy. They are everyday signals through which a cultural underlayer becomes visible.
Access still needs people to hold it
DA SWAMP tested what it means to make a temporary project accessible through free or pay-what-you-can participation. Openness does not mean an absence of structure. Someone still has to hold the room, relationships, invitations and conditions that make public involvement possible.
I keep DA SWAMP as a cultural project, not only an exhibition listing. It shows me working as an artist and curator inside a wider network, while Countercult remains distinct cultural infrastructure and the practices remain publicly distinct.