Statement March 2026

See original December 2024 statement

WE ARE WORKERS
We are choreographers, dancers, dramaturges, light and sound designers, curators, producers, technicians, educators, researchers, caregivers, organizers. We rehearse, teach, administer, mentor, produce, and sustain institutions without institutional status. We work continuously while remaining excluded from basic workers rights.

Freelance cultural labour sustains Berlin while absorbing disproportionate economic risk.
Artists are not symbolic assets. We are workers within a public cultural infrastructure.
What was framed as budget adjustment has become the structural dismantling of Berlin’s independent cultural ecosystem. Since 2024, approximately €130 million [1] has been withdrawn from Berlin’s cultural budget, reducing culture to less than 2% of total state spending [2], while the city continues to rely on artistic labour to sustain Berlin’s global identity as open, innovative, and internationally relevant. You cannot brand creativity while withdrawing the conditions that make it possible.

WE WERE ALREADY PRECARIOUS
Before the cuts:

• 92% of dance professionals were solo self-employed.

• Annual incomes of approximately €15,000 were common. [3]
• Funding success rates remained below 10% of applications.[4]
• Continuous unpaid labour sustained artistic production.
• Around 2,500 professionals work within Berlin’s dance sector alone — largely without institutional protection, employment security, or long-term infrastructure. Despite these conditions, freelance artists built Berlin’s internationally recognized performing arts landscape. [5]

We created networks where institutions did not exist.

We enabled education, migration, experimentation, access, and social encounter.

We produced cultural value far beyond the resources invested.

WE ARE BEING CUT
Now infrastructures built through decades of collective labour are being dismantled within a single budget cycle:

• artistic research funding eliminated,
• workspaces destabilized,
• documentation service (Tanzforum Berlin) shut down,
• production funding reduced,
• diversity infrastructure destabilised and international programmes reduced,
• future generations excluded before entering the field.

This is not reform.

It is extraction followed by abandonment.

CULTURE IS DEMOCRATIC INFRASTRUCTURE
Independent performing arts are not a luxury expenditure. They are urban infrastructure contributing directly to education and cultural participation, international exchange, tourism and economic activity, community cohesion, and democratic public space.

61% of visitors cite arts and culture as a primary reason for visiting Berlin [6], while cultural and creative industries represent a significant share of the city's workforce. When freelance dance disappears, the loss extends far beyond performance.

Cuts do not neutralize culture. They determine whose voices remain visible in public life. When this happens along the axes of marginalisation, discrimination, racism, antisemitism, and anti-Muslim racism, the risk is Kulturkampf. Within this economic and political climate, the conditions for censorship and self-censorship have increased.

This is a direct threat to a democratic society that has a duty to uphold the Basic Law:
     “Eine Zensur findet nicht statt. (There shall be no censorship)” — Art. 5(1) GG

     “Kunst und Wissenschaft, Forschung und Lehre sind frei. (Arts and sciences, research and teaching shall be free.)” — Art. 5(3) GG

We refuse to become instruments of polarisation. Our struggles are intersectional. Our struggles are interconnected.

POLICY DECISIONS ARE PRODUCING STRUCTURAL DAMAGE
Budget reductions already result in:

• cancelled productions
• loss of employment continuity,
• professional exit and migration of skilled workers,
• collapse of entry pathways for emerging artists,
• concentration of cultural production within large institutions only.

Allowing existing freelance infrastructures to collapse wastes decades of public investment and weakens Berlin’s long-term economic and cultural competitiveness.

Rebuilding destroyed ecosystems will cost significantly more than stabilizing them now.

WE REFUSE SCARCITY AS GOVERNANCE
We refuse cultural policies that force artists into competition for shrinking resources.

We refuse redistribution models that pit generations, aesthetics, and communities against each other.

We refuse gratitude politics that frames survival as privilege.

Precarity is not passion.

Self-exploitation is not resilience.

Silence is not professionalism.

When thousands of freelance workers lose income without protection, when migrant artists lose access to work, when marginalized communities lose infrastructure first — this is not neutral administration.

It is political decision-making with unequal consequences.

WHAT IS AT STAKE NOW
Without immediate intervention, Berlin risks:

• permanent loss of qualified cultural workers,
• irreversible disappearance of artistic knowledge,
• reduced international attractiveness,
• weakened cultural participation across the city,
• long-term economic and social damage.

The question is no longer whether cuts affect the field.
The question is whether Berlin intends to maintain a living cultural ecosystem at all.

WHAT WE DEMAND NOW
Immediate Stabilization:

• Reversal of cuts affecting independent performing arts and dance.
• Emergency stabilization funding for freelance artists and production structures.
• Restoration of artistic research and development funding.
• Protection of rehearsal and workspace infrastructures.

Structural Reform:

• Multi-year funding models beyond project precarity.
• Social security systems adapted to intermittent artistic labour.
• Paid sick leave and unemployment access compatible with freelance work.
• Adequate pension systems and stable employment recognition.
• Secure and simplified labour access for international artists.

Democratic Governance:

• Institutionalized consultation between policymakers and representatives of the independent performing arts sector prior to structural funding decisions.
• Transparent allocation of cultural resources preventing destructive internal competition.
• Dynamic funding that reflects growing inflation rates.

WE ORGANIZE BECAUSE WE MUST
Fragmentation has long defined freelance cultural labour. Isolation was structural. That era is ending.

We move toward collective representation, unionization, and coordinated advocacy across disciplines. 

If cultural labour sustains this city, cultural workers must have a voice in shaping its future.

Notes & Sources
[1] https://www.nmz.de/politik-betrieb/kulturpolitik/aktionsbuendnis-berlinistkultur-wehrt-sich-gegen-kultur
[2] https://archive.ph/vBTSO https://taz.de/Dramatische-Kulturkuerzungen-in-Berlin/!6139739/
[3] Income under €15,000: https://tanzbuero-berlin.de/artikel/tanzagenda2024/
[4] 10% funding success rate: https://tanzbuero-berlin.de/artikel/jurykommentar/
[5] 2,500 freelancers / precarity: https://tanzbuero-berlin.de/en/article/die-situation-des-berliner-tanzes-in-berlin-im-rahmen-der-haushaltsberatungen-prekaerer-als-je-zuvor-das-tanzraumberlin-netzwerk-schlaegt-alarm/
[6] 61% tourism / arts and culture: https://archive.ph/oScB6

 

14.12.2024

​STATEMENT
GERMAN (scroll down for english)

Die aktuellen Haushaltskürzungen bedrohen die Existenz, die kontinuierliche Arbeit und die Zukunftsperspektiven der freiberuflichen Zeitgenössischer Tanz/ Performance- Künstler*innen und Akteur*innen Berlins, ihre Infrastrukturen und ihre Spielstätten. Mit dem Freelance Dance Ensemble Berlin wollen wir Sichtbarkeit für Expertise, lokale und internationale Relevanz und Vernetzung der dynamischen Performing Arts-Landschaft in Berlin schaffen.

Jeder Projektantrag erfordert eine zeitintensive Vorbereitung, die eine Gestaltung komplexer Zeit- und Budgetpläne und die sorgfältige Zusammenstellung von künstlerischen Teams beinhaltet. In der letzten Förderrunde wurden nur ca. 9% der Anträge zur Einzelprojektförderung positiv entschieden. Bedingungen und Höhe der Fördermittel werden dem qualitativen und kreativen Potenzial der international geachteten Berliner Zeitgenössischer Tanz-/ Performance-Kunst nicht gerecht. Laut Systemcheck BFDK 2021-23/TanzAgenda24 sind 92% der Tanzschaffenden solo-selbständig. Viele haben ein jährliches Einkommen von ca. 15.000,00€.

Wir fordern eine Umstrukturierung des Berliner Fördersystems im Dialog mit der Gemeinschaft der in dem Bereich Zeitgenössischer Tanz/ Performance arbeitenden Akteur*innen: Statt kopfloser Kürzungen, die den erreichten Fortschritt und die Errungenschaften der Szene zunichtemachen, fordern wir ein zukunftsweisendes Update, eine gemeinsam erarbeitete Strategie, die eine generative und nachhaltige Zukunft fördert.

Neben der Rückgängigmachung der Kürzungen fordern wir außerdem verbesserte Arbeitsbedingungen:

• Bessere (oder: angepasste Bestimmungen zur) sozialversicherungsrechtliche(n) Absicherung
• Vereinfachte Regelungen beim Arbeitsmarktzugang für ausländische Künstler*innen
• Entgeltfortzahlung bei Krankheit oder Arbeitsunfällen ab Tag 1 sowie ein der komplexen Erwerbsrealität angepasster Zugang zur Arbeitslosenversicherung
• adäquat formulierte Altersvorsorge auch bei wechselnden Arbeitsverhältnissen
• ein Bekenntnis des Berliner Senats zur Schaffung nachhaltiger Arbeitsbedingungen für die freie Szene und zur Professionalisierung der Infrastrukturen für selbständige Berliner Künstler*innen

​
Die geplanten Kürzungen und ihre unilaterale Umsetzung - ohne Rücksprache mit den am meisten Betroffenen - sind in unseren Augen nicht nur ein Symptom für die Ignoranz und Unkenntnis gegenüber unseren ohnehin schon prekären Arbeitsbedingungen, sondern auch ein Beleg für das fehlende Verständnis der komplexen Strukturen, die unserer Arbeit zugrunde liegen. Diese Strukturen sind die Grundlage für unsere oft interdisziplinären, kollaborativen und hoch engagierten, politischen und sozialen, performativen Praktiken.

Hiermit laden wir  den Berliner Kultursenator und andere maßgebende Politiker*innen dazu ein, in einen Dialog mit uns zu treten, um ein tieferes Verständnis dafür zu erlangen, wie wir arbeiten und welche Bedingungen und Infrastrukturen unsere Arbeit erfordert.

Im Bereich Zeitgenössischer Tanz/ Performance tätig zu sein bedeutet heute viel mehr als Bühnenwerke zu schaffen, zu proben und auf Tournee zu gehen. Es umfasst auch künstlerisch-wissenschaftliche Forschung, Praktiken der Fürsorge und soziale Arbeit, politische Arbeit, kontinuierliches Lernen, Lehren, Mentoring, essayistisches Schreiben, Management, Organisations - und Produktionsarbeit.

Die drastischen Einsparungen bei Strukturen - wie etwa dem Projektbüro Diversity Arts Culture oder der Berlin Mondiale; Strukturen, die Kulturschaffende über Jahrzehnte aufgebaut haben - ist ein Akt der Zerstörung und der Missachtung, insbesondere gegenüber marginalisierten Gruppen.

Wir weisen darauf hin, dass es durchaus Beispiele dafür gibt, wie Kulturarbeit nachhaltiger gestaltet werden kann. In Nachbarländern wie Frankreich und Belgien haben freischaffende Künstler*innen Zugang zum „status d'intermittence“, einem System, das in Zeiten der Arbeitslosigkeit oder bei Verletzungen Unterstützung bietet. In einem wirtschaftlich so starken Land wie Deutschland ist es unverhältnismäßig, dass freischaffende Künstler*innen und Ihre Co-Akteur*innen weit mehr als 40 Stunden in der Woche arbeiten, aber keine Aussicht auf eine Rente haben.

Künstlerische Expertise ist das Resultat einer kontinuierlichen finanziellen Investition in künstlerische Forschung und künstlerische Arbeit. Sie entsteht durch Zusammenarbeit und ist das Ergebnis der engagierten Arbeit vieler Menschen, von kompetenten und hochgradig  ausgebildeten Teams, die Künstler*innen in langen Schaffensprozessen unterstützen. 

Die Stadt Berlin und ihre Bewohner verdienen eine diverse, reiche, blühende Kunstszene und Künstler*innen, die nicht in der Prekarität gefangen sind.
Angesichts der drohenden Kürzungen schlagen wir vor, einen kollektiven Prozess zur Entwicklung einer Gewerkschaft einzuleiten, um unsere Arbeit, unsere professionellen Bedürfnisse und unsere Rechte einzufordern und zu vertreten. 
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STATEMENT
ENGLISH
​
The current budget cuts threaten the existence, continuity, and future prospects of freelance performing artists and other cultural workers, their infrastructure, and their venues. With the Freelance Dance Ensemble Berlin, we aim to create visibility for the expertise, local and international relevance, and interconnectedness of the dynamic performing arts landscape in Berlin.

Each project application requires time-consuming preparation, which includes the creation of complex time and budget plans and the careful composition of artistic teams. In the last funding round, only around 9% of applications for individual project funding were approved. The conditions and amount of funding do not do justice to the qualitative and creative potential of Berlin's internationally respected contemporary dance/performance art. According to the BFDK system check 2021-23/TanzAgenda24, 92% of dance professionals are solo self-employed. A yearly income of around 15.000,00€ is common.
We demand a restructuring of Berlin’s funding system in dialogue with the performing arts community—a forward-looking update that fosters a generative future rather than uninspired cuts that undo the progress of the scene.
In addition to reversing the cuts, we call for improved working conditions, including:

• Better (or: adapted) social security provisions
• Simplified labor market access regulations for foreign artists
• Continued payment of wages in the event of illness or accidents at work from day 1 and access to unemployment insurance adapted to the complex reality of employment
• Adequately formulated retirement provision, even in the case of changing employment relationships.
• A commitment from the Berliner Senat to establish sustainable conditions for Berlin-based performing artists and the freelance scene to professionalize their infrastructures.

The planned cuts and their unilateral implementation—without consulting the people most affected—are, in our eyes, not only a symptom of ignorance towards our already precarious working conditions but also evidence of a lack of understanding of the complex structures that underpin our work. These structures are the foundation for our often interdisciplinary, collaborative, and highly engaged political, social, and performative practices.
We hereby invite Berlin’s cultural senator and other relevant politicians to engage in a dialogue with us to gain a deeper understanding of how we work and what our work requires to thrive.

Being active and self employed in the performing arts today means much more than creating stage works, rehearsing and touring. It also includes artistic research, practices of care, social work, education, political work, grant writing, accounting, organizational and production work, continuous learning, teaching, mentoring and management.

The drastic de-funding of structures—such as the Diversity Fund, or Berlin Mondiale, which cultural workers have built over decades—is an act of destruction and disrespect, particularly toward marginalized groups.
However, there are examples of how cultural work can be structured more sustainably. In neighboring countries like France and Belgium, freelance artists have access to the “status d’intermittence,” a system that provides support during periods of unemployment or injury. In an economically strong country like Germany, it is disproportionate that freelance artists work a 40-hour week yet have no prospects of a pension.

Artistic expertise is the result of the dedicated work of many people: competent and highly educated teams that support long creation processes and the continuous financial investment in artistic research and work. 
The city of Berlin and its residents deserve a thriving arts scene and artists who are not trapped in precarity.
​
In light of these funding cuts, we propose initiating a process to formalize our labor, needs, and rights through the development of a union. This would provide a collective voice for an often solitary and fragmented field.