AN ODD COLLECTION
Toilets, cheese, snails and telephones for the walls of the living room at 2 Paul Robeson Street* in eastern Berlin. Don't ask why. Flat-mates Jens and Volker started decorating, then let me get on with it after I drunkenly outlined the picture-frames either side of my bedroom door. I lived there for three years. Lots of parties and happy memories from the beginning, started painting, grew kiff on the balcony; until a depression set in.
 
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It's here we filmed 'Bucket' and did the shoots for the Kreuzberg murals. An odd collection of room-mates came and went, girlfriends too. I moved out, and Jens came back from Copenhagen to move in again with Volker. They will be giving the flat up soon and according to a peculiar code of German landlords, must paint the place nice and white ready for the next occupants. I suggested wallpapering first, to preserve the paintings for someone to discover at a future date - a bit kaput and nicely 'aged'. Such an effect I've often attempted to reproduce, but the truth is that the most beautiful walls are imperfect for having witnessed real history.
At the time of painting I was still with K., hence the mouse (me) and the pretty toilet (K.) which has just popped out for a visit from behind the mountains. The distance between us during four of our five years together was, on average, a thousand kilometers - the distance between Berlin and Budapest.
*Mr Robeson, the singing socialist.
(Autumn 2002)
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