What is silence? Ten people, ten answers
Ten very different lives, one question – captured in short, powerful video portraits.
Berlin’s private side
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Bastian Fritsche is a trained automotive mechatronics technician who works shifts for Berlin’s public transport company, cleaning the tram tracks of the bustling capital. To stop BVG trams from derailing, the rails have to be cleared of dirt every week using special vehicles. Does he experience a different Berlin during his night shifts on the suction vehicle?
Team: Henryc Fels, Pha Croissant, Jasper Hill
Bass forever
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Emmi, also known as DJ REMSI, makes Indiego Glocksee, an event venue in the heart of Hannover, shake with her music. She works there as a DJ, booker and awareness officer. In a male-dominated music and DJ scene, the path to the decks cannot be taken for granted by FLINTA* people. As resident DJ at Indiego Glocksee, Emmi campaigns for exactly that to become a matter of course.
Team: Salome Ophelia Ziermann, Anjou Vartmann, Marius Zweifel
Between song and applause
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As the singer in a band, Hanna experiences a special kind of silence before and after her performances. Before the first song begins, she pauses briefly to take a breath. And when the notes of the final chord fade away, she finds herself sharing a moment of stillness and feeling with the audience, before the applause fills the room and breaks the silence.
Team: Armina Ahmadinia, Ben Kümmel, Leonard Mikoleit Acuña
Silence at the push of a button
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Jannis has been deaf since birth. At ten months he received a cochlear implant for his right ear, thanks to which he can now hear. He only got an implant in his left ear at the age of 11. As soon as Jannis takes off the implants, there is absolute silence for him. For the trained bookseller, this silence has many positive associations: it allows him to find calm even in hectic everyday life. Jannis also likes to switch off the devices when he is reading.
Team: Sophie Boyer, Deliah El-Chehade, Noemi Ehrat
Quiet outside, loud inside
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At the Kirche der Stille (Church of Silence) in Hannover, pastor Christine Tergau-Harms offers exercises and meditations as well as services. In them, she explores silence and its effect and meaning for us and our lives. Does silence get too little room in fast-paced modern life?
Team: Etienne Dötsch, Thilo Koppen
A place that does you good
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In a community solidarity garden in the backyards of Hannover’s Calenberger Neustadt, people grow vegetables together that anyone is free to harvest. For Bastian Pritsch, who is involved in the ‘Baulücke’ (vacant lot), the work there has a very personal meaning. For him, the Baulücke is a place of silence in an otherwise noisy and busy city.
Team: Andreas Blauth, Noah Hermann, Malte Laudahn
Racket, noise or music?
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Hans, a recent graduate, lives in a shared flat in the Calenberger Neustadt. The Hannover neighbourhood, a popular place for students to go out, is not far from the city centre. His room faces a very busy street, directly above a kiosk, close to several cafés and bars and a tram depot. Hans tries to cope with the noise around him through meditation.
Team: Tim Kirchhof, Yann Kanngiesser, Finn Andorra
Inner calm
The Vietnamese pagoda Viên Giác in Döhren-Wülfel, Hannover, is one of the largest in Europe. It is a place of encounter that invites conversation, meditation and prayer. Hanh Dinh is the abbot here; besides a ceremony in the morning, his daily life is shaped by meditation and the teachings of the Buddha, which is also reflected in how he sees silence.
Team: Lennart Holste, Jannis Schubert, Bastian Betz
Silence as a privilege
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Zina is a student and musician. She lives in a three-person shared flat in Hannover’s Nordstadt. Her room is small, with just enough space to move in and out. On top of the noise from trains and road traffic during the day, she is often woken at night by the bar a few floors below her flat. For Zina, concentration or relaxation is a luxury. Noise and a lack of quiet places are part of everyday life for most students. For some people, silence is a matter of course. For people like Zina, however, it is a privilege.
Team: Bahriye Tatli, Lucas Nguyen
A project by the class of 2022:
