In front of the Bethanien, Berlin. Klaus-Peter Köpping is smoking, I’m drinking a coffee. He starts a conversation with the other smokers, also workshop participants. He might say he “entered into a conversation” with them. Spontaneous, unconstrained, alert. With humour. Unique. I’m about to leave for Schleswig, a town in northern Germany. He knows the place, mentions his observations about the fjord near it, the Schlei, and leaves room for mine.
I’m getting to know a universal scholar who has seen a lot of world. From the Schlei to Afghanistan. His old 8mm films, which I offer to digitize. He listens, makes you listen.
A keen observer of people. Someone who enables conversations.
Thank you, Klaus-Peter.
Twice we meet in front of the camera, in 2012 and 2015. A cafe of his choice in Charlottenburg known for its cakes, which he doesn’t eat. And for the Rembetiko, a kind of Greek blues. Sound recording proves difficult, one camera stops working entirely. We are sitting by the window. Some of this can be seen in the video “Klaus-Peter Köpping, Fellow”… Some of this disappeared in the editing, and much is left unsaid. The video is too long and, of course, much too short.
Klaus-Peter Köpping, Fellow.
Video filmed and edited by Thomas Martius.
2nd cameras: Florian Brossmann, Florian Thamer.
Berlin, 2012-2015.