Villa Aurora Events Archive

November 2013

Hannah Arendt Conference

November 9, 2013–November 10, 2013

Los Angeles

WHAT IS POLITICS?

A Conference on Hannah Arendt at Villa Aurora on November 9th and 10th, 2013

On November 9th, the date of “Reichskristallnacht“ in Germany in 1938, Villa Aurora, together with the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College, hosted a conference on Hannah Arendt by the title of “What is Politics?”.

The German-Jewish-American thinker Hannah Arendt, born in Hannover, exiled to Paris and later to New York, dedicated her work to the reinvention of the public realm and to freedom in political action. Today, as in the 1960s, the ideas of this woman philosopher inspire theoretical debates as well as civil political initiatives. The conference with lectures by experts on Hannah Arendt’s work focused on the influence of her European-American experience and the particular importance of transcultural exchange in Arendt’s theory of political action.

Please find videos of the following lectures on our media-page:

Welcome & Opening Remarks
Annette Rupp, Executive Director Villa Aurora & Marie Luise Knott (Concept), Freelance Author, Journalist and Translator

The Origins of Totalitarianism in Historical Perspective
Anson Rabinbach, Princeton University

Revolutionary Declarations and the Status of Human Rights
Peg Birmingham, DePaul University

The Aesthetics of Arendt’s Politics
Equality, Plurality, and the Enthusiasm of the Spectators
Martín Plot, California Institute of the Arts

Hannah Arendt: The Primacy of Appearance
Robert Harrison, Stanford University

Who is Capable of Performing Action? Some Thoughts on the Importance of Personality
Wolfgang Heuer, Freie Universität Berlin

As part of the conference, Roger Berkowitz, Academic Director of the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College, talked about Jewish Voices in the Eichmann-Controversy at Skirball Cultural Center on November 10th. The lecture was followed by the screening of Margarethe von Trotta’s movie Hannah Arendt and a Q&A session.

Oh Boy

November 19, 2013 7:00 pm

Los Angeles

OH BOY, Germany 2012, 83 min., digital

Jan Ole Gerster's wry and vibrant feature debut OH BOY, which swept the 2013 German Film Awards, paints a day in the life of Niko, a twenty-something college dropout going nowhere fast.

Niko lives for the moment as he drifts through the streets of Berlin, curiously observing everyone around him and oblivious to his growing status as an outsider. Then on one fateful day, through a series of absurdly amusing encounters, everything changes: his girlfriend rebuffs him, his father cuts off his allowance, and a strange psychiatrist dubiously confirms his 'emotional imbalance'. Meanwhile, a former classmate insists she bears no hard feelings toward him for his grade-school taunts when she was "Roly Poly Julia," but it becomes increasingly apparent that she has unfinished business with him. Unable to ignore the consequences of his passivity any longer, Niko finally concludes that he has to engage with life.

Shot in timeless black and white and enriched with a snappy jazz soundtrack, this slacker dramedy is a love letter to Berlin and the Generation Y experience.

In Person: Director Jan-Ole Gerster

Watch the trailer…

OH BOY got four nominations @ European Film Awards: Best Film, Best Actor, European Discovery and Peoples Choice. Support Jan-Ole by voting here for him and the Peoples Choice Award!

Jan-Ole Gerster was born in Hagen. He studied script writing and directing at the Berlin Film and Television Academy (DFFB). In 2010 Gerster started work on his graduation film OH BOY with Tom Schilling in the lead role. The movie premiered at the 2012 Munich Filmfestival. OH BOY garnered international acclaim and won the 2013 German Film Prize in six categories, among them for Best Screenplay, Best Director and Best Film.

At Villa Aurora, Gerster will tackle his new project 'Cool Germania', a rise-and-fall story of two friends in the Berlin of the 90s and zeros.

Admission: Free

Location: Villa Aurora, 520 Paseo Miramar, Los Angeles, CA 90272
Street parking is available on Los Liones Drive. Shuttle service starts at 6 pm from Los Liones Drive, off Sunset Boulevard two blocks North-East of Pacific Coast Highway.
Please do not park on the Topanga State Park Lot!

Villa Aurora Night

November 26, 2013

Berlin

In November 2013 Villa Aurora celebrated the annual Villa Aurora Night to welcome the 2014 Fellows and to present their works. For the first time the event was held at the Lapidarium in Berlin with a close circle of invited guests from arts, culture, politics and the media.

The opening speeches were delivered by Dr. Hans-Ulrich Seidt, Head of Culture and Communication at the Federal Foreign Office, and Björn Böhning, head of the Senate Chancellery.

Former Villa Aurora Fellow Dietrich Brüggemann and the German BeatBox Champion, Daniel Mandolini, marked the beginning of the event by accompanying a silent movie from the 1920s. DJ Paul Kaeding provided the night with music.