Berlin’s cultural landscape is facing drastic cuts in public funding in the very near future: 10% for the year 2025 and an additional 10% for the year 2026 have been announced by Berlin’s political decision-makers.
For Deutsches Theater Berlin, a repertoire theatre with an ensemble of actors, permanent staff and fixed infrastructure and building costs, budget cuts of this scale would strongly endanger our capacity to produce new art over the next years. For other organisations, especially from the independent scene, it could mean completely disappearing.
Berlin’s rich and varied cultural offering, its reputation for artistic excellence, risk-taking and its international influence, are being threatened by this proposal. We regret the lack of long-term vision for Berlin, at a time in which cultural and arts organisations offer much-needed spaces for social interaction and encounters, social dialogue, cultural and political education.
Since the first announcements, Deutsches Theater Berlin has gotten together with all the other cultural organisations that benefit from public funding from the City-State of Berlin to jointly protest, with a petition, regular action days, calls to our audience and social media campaigns.
We also count on the solidarity of our international partners.
Cover photo: Julia Baier
