What's on in June
May 28, 2013
When temperatures start rising in Germany, music fans are drawn outside to rather unusual venues like former airports and speedways where international rock, pop and electro bands do their thing under the open sky.
One of the most famous music festivals is Rock am Ring at the Nürburgring racetrack in North-Rhine Westphalia (June 7-9), attracting up to half a million visitors. This year, alternative rock group Thirty Seconds to Mars from Los Angeles and British electro-punk band The Prodigy will be headlining.
At the Hurricane Festival in Scheessel near Bremen (June 21-23), Canadian rock band Billy Talent and Californian rockers Queens of the Stone Age will be taking to the stage. In addition to the international lineup, the alternative atmosphere and on-site camping also draw thousands of fans to the Hurricane Festival.
The future of design
On June 5, around 400 young designers from all over the world will come together at the International Design Festival in Berlin to present unconventional concepts and exchange ideas on the future of design. The best pieces will be honored with a DMY Award.
This year the focus of the festival is design from Poland, the best of which will be represented by over 40 design studios, businesses, universities and exhibitions. The Polish participants were selected by design professor Czeslawa Frejlich and the Vice President of the Association of Polish Artists and Designers Michal Stefanowski.
Open doors to all nations
Those hoping to take a spontaneous trip around the world this month can do so at the All Nations Festival in Berlin. On June 5, around 30 embassies and cultural institutions will be hosting a variety of events and exhibitions all about their national culture. The festival's theme this year is superstition.
Experience global theater
The Theaterformen Festival in Hannover showcases outlandish, contemporary theater productions from different continents. Around 220 theater producers from 15 countries will be presenting their works in different venues across the city from June 19-30.
Amir Reza Koohestani's adaptation of Chekov's tragedy "Ivanov" is set to open the festival. It expresses the melancholy concerns of the Iranian postmodern.
The focus of the festival is works from Kinshasa, the capital city of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The German Federal Cultural Foundation supports the cooperation between the theater and dance festival Connexion Kin in Kinshasa. Theater productions are first staged in Kinshasa and then in Hannover, offering audiences a Germany a taste of the culture scene in the DR Congo.
With his piece "Drums and Digging," Faustin Linyekula takes audiences on a journey to home on the edge of the equator, the small village of Obilo. Linyekula's work is about forgetting and displacement, exploring the issues terror, war and economic collapse in his country.
Christopher Street Day
On June 22, lesbians, gay, transgender, inter- and bisexual people will gather for the Christopher Street Day parade to demonstrate for equal rights. The festival also celebrates what the campaign has achieved over the past few decades.
Christopher Street Day will be marked in numerous cities across Germany, including Berlin, where around 300,000 lesbian and gay people help shape the culture of the city.