LICHTENBERG LAUNDERETTE
India Roper-Evans’ project ‘Lichtenberg Launderette’ was shot at the Lemke Haus in Lichtenberg, designed by Mies van der Rohe, director of the Bauhaus between 1931-33. He built the house for Martha and Karl Lemke in 1932, the couple lived there until 1945 when the Red Army requisitioned the building and used it as a garage. From the 1960s until the fall of the Berlin Wall, the State Security (STASI) of the GDR used the house as a laundry depot. This prompted the idea of making a short black and white film with a soundtrack about them, using this modernist house as a launderette. The history of East Berlin post WW II, especially Lichtenberg, is full of horror stories during their regime, I wanted to make a project about the beautiful side of Lichtenberg, showing this modern, open house on a peaceful lake; parodying the STASI for using it as a launderette. The actual house is the polar opposite of a State Security run place, with open plan spaces, large glass windows and great emphasis on light and transparency. ‘Lichtenberg Launderette’ was shot in one day, with 4 actors, 3 performing the washing and 1 dressed as a Lampshade, referencing the Bauhaus’ love for design, furniture and illumination. Time to wash out the ugly past and celebrate, shed light on, the beauty and tranquility that originally inspired it.
Laundry song: Indelible Mies
Doing the Berlin Laundry
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Telling the Mies van der story
In Lichtenberg Launderette
From Obersee to the Great Lakes
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Skin & Bones design he makes
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Ghostly skyscraper next
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Tugendhat for the Czechs
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Then laundered out
In Lichtenberg Launderette
He leaves his clout
In Lichtenberg Launderette
As the Stasi rub-a-dub-dub
In Lichtenberg Launderette
van der Rohe into a tub
In Lichtenberg Launderette
Yet here he is despite the scour
In Lichtenberg launderette
To this very same hour
