July 30, 2020

The Thomas Mann House Advisory Board selected the following six fellowship recipients for a 2021 residency at the former home of Thomas Mann in Los Angeles:

July 1, 2020

Berlin/Potsdam/Los Angeles – Berlin-based director Anna Sofie Hartmann is awarded the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg sponsored Villa Aurora Fellowship, for a three-month stay in 2021 at the artists' residence in Los Angeles.

#MutuallyMann was an interactive reading experience and a space for transatlantic conversation in times of social distancing and quarantine.

Berlin-based musician Ilgen-Nur receives 2021 fellowship at the Villa Aurora. This is the eighth fellowship awarded by Musicboard Berlin in cooperation with VATMH.

Freimut Duve, former Member of the German Bundestag, died on March 3, 2020 in Hamburg after a long illness.

Esa-Pekka Salonen, composer and conductor laureate for the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Music Director Designate of the San Francisco Symphony, and The New Yorker music critic Alex Ross hosted an evening of music at the Thomas Mann House.

On January 9, Jan Philipp Reemtsma came to the Thomas Mann House to talk about democracy and emphatic language.

Applications for Thomas Mann Fellowships in 2021 are open.

Ilse Helbrecht, a Thomas Mann Fellow and social geographer, recently met with the Canadian political geographer, Jennifer Hyndman, at the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles. In their conversation, the two acclaimed scholars are looking deeper into the meaning and transformation of the terms ‘exile’ and ‘refugee'.

Nora Fingscheidt is awarded MFG-Star and will travel to Villa Aurora

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Around 450 guests from culture, politics and the media came to the Komische Oper Berlin in mid-November to celebrate the VATMH Night 2019.

Author and Villa Aurora fellow Stefanie de Velasco went on strike for the climate and refuses to continue writing her next novel.

Goethe’s Weimar Edition crossed the Atlantic together with Thomas Mann and followed him all the way to Los Angeles. In 1952, the luxury editions left the Pacific Palisades and are now returning home.

How can we use digital solutions to protect ourselves from fake news and discrimination? “Pocket Democracy”, a conference organized by the Thomas Mann House and Goethe Pop Up Seattle, interrogated that topic in a two-day format.

Out of 77 applications, the advisory board of the Thomas Mann House selected twelve fellows for a fellowship for the year 2020 in the former L.A. residence of Thomas Mann.

Thomas Mann House sat down with Fellow Lisa Riedner and Los Angeles Community Action Network (LA CAN) founder and director Pete White to discuss the global housing crisis through the lens of Los Angeles and Germany.
We found that similar structures and dynamics exist in both places and that houselessness should be regarded as a global crisis.

How is fear currently shaping our society? And can art play a role in addressing those fears? These questions were at the core of “Raising Fear: Film, Literature, and Political Responsibility” on Friday, July 5, at the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles.  Moderated by Steven Lavine, chairman of the Thomas Mann House advisory board, the evening drew deep insights from the event’s esteemed guests: German state minister Monika Grütters, filmmaker Werner Herzog, and cultural scientist Ulrich Raulff. From art’s relationship with democracy, to misguided demonization, to fighting for an open culture, the relevancy of the night’s conversation was emphasized and punctuated by the rumblings of a distant 7.1 earthquake.

Following in his grandfather's tracks, Frido Mann is going to give lectures in more than a dozen cities in the United States and Canada. He will address the current crises in the American and European democracies and the need for their restoration, on the basis of transatlantic dialogue.

On May 27 and May 28, Thomas Mann House and UCLA Digital Humanities hosted "Moral Code: Ethics in the Digital Age". The conference with over 150 attendees and participants in total discussed the ethical implications of artificial intelligence.

Starting in 2020, Villa Aurora &Thomas Mann House will award the Michael Ballhaus Fellowship under the patronage of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Heiko Maas. The annual fellowship is given to outstanding directors of photography in cooperation with the German Film Academy. The first laureate is the Berlin based D.P. Judith Kaufmann. The prize, in honor of the late director of photography Michael Ballhaus, consists of a three-month residence at Villa Aurora in Los Angeles and is financed by the German Foreign Office.

The Egyptian journalist Hadeer El-Mahdawy is awarded the 2019 Feuchtwanger Fellowship by Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House and the University of Southern California. The fellowship was named after the Jewish writer Lion Feuchtwanger who had to leave Nazi-Germany in 1933 and lived at Villa Aurora in Los Angeles starting in 1943 until his death in 1958.

During his time as Thomas Mann Fellow from April to July, Andreas Platthaus is writing a blog sharing his impressions, life and research at the Thomas Mann House, Los Angeles. The blog is accompanied by artworks of illustrator Burkhard Neie.

Last Saturday, the day before the Oscars, the traditional reception in honor of the German Oscar nominees took place at the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles. This event was organized by Villa Aurora together with the German Consulate General L.A. and German Films. Partners of the reception are the German sponsors of the Oscar contributions, the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg, Film- und Medienstiftung NRW, Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung and the Federal Foreign Office. The event was sponsored by Volkswagen, Dr. Hauschka and Crosby Doe Associates.

The ninth biennial meeting of the International Feuchtwanger Society (IFS) will take place on October 17-20, 2019 in Munich. What role did the “Munich milieu” play for the young intellectual? Which of the impressions and influences of the Munich art, theater and literary scene can be demonstrated? Which networks and connections motivated the ambitious young author? Proposals that are closely related to the conference topic are welcome along with papers that explore Munich’s cultural scene between 1900 and 1925. Papers should not exceed 20 minutes.

During his lifetime, German-Jewish novelist Lion Feuchtwanger claimed not to keep a diary. Yet, in the 1990s, a treasure trove of his diaries from the years 1906-1940 was found in the apartment of Feuchtwanger’s long-time secretary Hilde Waldo. Now, for the first time ever, these diaries have been published by Aufbau publishing house in Berlin, allowing us to get to know Feuchtwanger as a chronicler of his life and of a central part of German history. Last December we presented the book at the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles. You can rewatch the event in this video:

For a stay at the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles in 2020 Thomas Mann Fellowships are tendered. The fellowships will be awarded for the year 2020 and for a period of 3 to 10 months. The former home of Thomas Mann in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, is a residence house of the Federal Republic of Germany with the aim of stimulating debates on the political, social or cultural situation on both sides of the Atlantic.[Text in German]

As a Thomas Mann Fellow in 2018, Jutta Allmendinger has been conducting her research on housing and homelessness in Los Angeles. We accompanied her during the “Skid Row Festival” in Downtown. Skid Row is an area of 0.4 square miles containing one of the largest populations of homeless people in the United States. Together with her colleague, Jürgen Robert von Mahs (New School, NY), Allmendinger made use of the opportunity to speak to some of Skid Row’s residents.

On November 29th and 30th, representatives of "Thomas Mann Houses International", a network that curates the heritage of the famous autor, came together in Zürich. The institutions (Lübeck: Buddenbrookhaus, Munich: Monacensia in the Hildebrandhaus, Nidden / Lithuania: Thomas Mann Cultural Center, Pacific Palisades / USA: Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V, Zurich / Switzerland: Thomas Mann Archive of ETH Zurich) first gathered in Lübeck in 2017. The network was doudned in order to enrich and strengthen each other.

In cooperation with Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V., the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes grants another scholarship in 2019 for a stay at the artist's residence called Villa Aurora. Out of a variety of applications, the choice fell on the video and performance artist Max Göran. He will live and work in Los Angeles from early January to mid-February.

In our video blog, Jennifer and Brad Johnson from Johnson Rare Books & Archives give insights on the reconstruction of Thomas Mann's library at his home on San Remo Drive.

Sculptor and Villa Aurora Fellow Natascha Sadr Haghighian will represent Germany at the 58th Venice Biennale under the pseudonym Natascha Süder Happelmann. Franciska Zólyom, curator of the German Pavilion 2019, announced the collaboration with the artist on Thursday.

Entrepreneur and patron Berthold Leibinger died on October 16, 2018 in Stuttgart/Germany. He was 87 years old. The team and the Board of Directors of Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V. mourn this great loss and wish his family, friends and colleagues much strength.

The Villa Aurora juries have selected the 2019 Fellows for the Villa Aurora in Los Angeles.

Wolf von Lojewski, longtime US correspondent and presenter of the ZDF heute-journal, gives his valuable collection of Thomas Mann original editions to the Thomas Mann House.

In our video blog, Heinrich Detering, a fellow at Thomas Mann House, tells the story of Thomas Mann's relationship with the Unitarian Church in Los Angeles.

On September 15th, "Zeige deine Klasse" by Villa Fellow Daniela Dröscher will be available in Bookstore. The book is a clairvoyant portrait of social background. From a radically subjective perspective, Dröscher examines how class affiliation shapes one's own self-image and social interaction to this day, but also how much shame the term is still occupied with.

"Styx", the first collaboration between Villa Fellows Ika Küntzel and Wolfgang Fischer, comes into cinemas on thursday.

Villa Fellow Carolina Hellsgård's new film “Endzeit” (Ever After) celebrates its world premiere in the Discovery Program of the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival (Tiff).

The Board of Directors of Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V., in agreement with the Board of Trustees, has appointed Ms. Heike Catherina Mertens new Executive Director of the association, based in Berlin and effective October 1, 2018. Ms. Mertens succeeds Ms.Annette Rupp, who at her own request will leave the association end of September.

The Advisory Council of Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V., which includes representatives from culture, science, civil society and business, has selected the 2019 Thomas Mann House Fellows.

At the beginning of June, Laemmle's presents the film classic "Aimée & Jaguar" starring Villa Aurora Fellow Maria Schrader. The actress will be present.

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At the end of June, the VATMH-supported conference of Wirtschaftswoche "Morals & Machines" took place in Berlin.

On Monday night, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier inaugurated the Thomas Mann House in Los Angeles. More than 250 guests from the fields of culture, science, politics, and the media gathered in the house on San Remo Drive in Pacific Palisades, where the Mann Family lived during their US exile in the 1940s.

Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. [Nbsp] V. and Literaturhaus Berlin took the annual event in remembrance of the book burning on May 10, 1933 as an opportunity to explore the limits of the sayable together with Linguistics-Professor Anatol Stefanowitsch.

Jana Schulz has been a fellow of the German Studienstiftung at the Villa Aurora in the spring of 2018. In an interview with the Studienstiftung she talks about boxing and her experiences in L.A.

Director, author and Villa Fellow Ulrich Köhler receives his first invitation to the International Film Festival Cannes (May 8th through 19th) with his new film "In My Room". Main producer is Pandora Film Produktion from Cologne. The film is invited to section Un Certain Regard.

Villa Fellow Stefan Goldmann curates f(t) festival. The two day festival will highlight alternative concepts of time in music: Irregular metres, miniatures, works of gargantuan duration, idiosyncratic patterns, new practices for historic instruments and obsolete media, humanised machine time, mechanised improvisation, space-time relations in close proximity and at vast distance... and much more.

Around 300 representatives of the German and international film and cultural scene came together last Saturday at the annual reception at the Villa Aurora, German Films and the German Consulate General in Los Angeles to celebrate the German Oscar hopes.

Bundeskunsthalle presents works by five recipients of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung's Künstlerförderung, who were Villa Aurora Fellows as well.

Director RP Kahl was a Fellow of Villa Aurora in 2013. During this time he began his work on the feature film A THOUGHT OF ECSTACY, which is coming to German cinemas these days. We met him in Berlin for a chat.

Last Saturday night the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences (BBAW) at the Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin gave room to the question borrowed by Kurt Tucholsky “Is language a weapon”. “One could be afraid of language and its effects”, stated Martin Grötschel, President of the Academy, in his welcoming address.

Villa Fellow Silke Scheuermann takes over the renowned Frankfurt Poetikdozentur. As of January 23, 2018, she will speak about her poetology on three consecutive Tuesdays under the title JUST STILL DARK ENOUGH.

On December 8 and 9 the Berlin Congress on Exile during 1933-1945 titled "Off to Moscow! Travel Reports from the Exile" took place at Literaturhaus Berlin under the direction of Hermann Haarmann (Berlin) and Anne Hartmann (Bochum) with the support of the Prussian Seehandlung Foundation, the Institute for Communication History and Applied Cultural Studies of the Free University Berlin and Villa Aurora   & Thomas Mann House e. V.

Berlin, November 22 and 23, 2017: Circuit Training is a workshop ensemble initiated & founded by Ignaz Schick 2013 in Berlin with the aim of bringing together musicians from different styles and scenes once or twice a year for working on new pieces of its core members.

At the annual get-together of this and next year's Villa Fellows, we presented "Staahaadler Aff", a composition for percussion and sample pad by Oxana Omelchuk.

Around 300 invited guests from culture, politics and the media came to the Komische Oper Berlin at the end of October to celebrate the VILLA AURORA & THOMAS MANN HOUSE NIGHT.

Villa Aurora Fellow Jan Wagner was awarded the Georg Büchner Prize on Saturday at the autumn conference of the German Academy of Language and Literature. The 50,000 Euro prize is deemed the highest German literary honor. In his acceptance speech Wagner spoke of Georg Büchner's political and literary writings in which language is no longer "a means to an end".

Filmmaker Justin B Rathke, also known as Justin Time, was a Fellow at Villa Aurora in spring 2013. Now he presents his film "Chasing houses", which was created during his stay in LA, this November in Berlin. We met him there.

The author Senthuran Varatharajah from Berlin has been a Fellow at Villa Aurora since the beginning of October. Over the next couple of weeks he will take our Instagram channel for a spin. To start, he answered a few questions.

Berlinische Galerie presents What Do You Want Here, an exhibition by Villa Fellow Cyrill Lachauer

The journalist Sylke Tempel died on Thursday in an accident caused by the storm "Xavier". In September she was selected to be one of the first Thomas Mann Fellows. Sylke Temple died at the age 54 years.

The MFG Filmförderung Baden-Württemberg and FernsehfilmFestival Baden-Baden have announced the four nominees for the MFG-Star star award. The juror Dorothee Schön will award the prize-winner on December 1, 2017.

In 2016, Alwin Lay spent three months at Villa Aurora as a fellow of KunstSalon Cologne. The exhibition TILT & SHIFT at will be Fuhrwerkswaage Kunstraum closely related to his stay.

Kirsten Reeses's composition "Atmende Kugel" will premiered at Kontakte'17.

The Board of Trustees of Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e.V., whose members include representatives of the Federal Foreign Office and the office of the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, has nominated the first group of fellows for the Thomas Mann House Los Angeles

Sebastian Stumpf stayed at Villa Aurora in 2016. Some works that were created during this period are now being presented at Galerie Thomas Fischer in Berlin.

Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e. V., this year together with the project space 68projects of Galerie Kornfeld Berlin, will once again award the Berlin Fellowship to an outstanding artist from Los Angeles. The choice fell on Sandeep Mukherjee.

We congratulate the following artists, who have been selected for a fellowship at the artists' residence Villa Aurora in Los Angeles in 2018 by the jury from numerous applications. We look forward to welcome them in California.

The Federal Republic of Germany has acquired the former residence of exiled author and Nobel Laureate Thomas Mann in Los Angeles. The artist residence Villa Aurora will be entrusted with the administration of the house. Villa Aurora Chair Markus Klimmer, and Executive Director Annette Rupp, together with Doris Barnett, Member of the German Bundestag, were officially presented the keys.