Speech is Not Free VII

The event transforms one of the city's most vibrant independent galleries into a place of radical imagination, where avant-garde art and political expression meet. Through live performances, film poems and experimental soundscapes,

Speech is Not Free VII revives the rebellious spirit of the Beat Generation – reinterpreted through the lens of the contemporary Berlin art scene.


Friday, 7 November — Voices of Resistance

The festival opens with Uahuu Tujendapi, whose powerful voice sets the tone for an evening of boundary-pushing.

Highlights include The Blue Whale of Madness, a cinepoem by M. Garcia Teutsch with a live performance by Claire Uicker, combining surreal film aesthetics and spoken word.

Accompanying video installations inspired by Allen Ginsberg's Fall of America immerse the audience in a meditative audiovisual landscape.

The evening concludes with The Swallows of America: A Poem Protest in One Act with Anna Bănică — a lyrical and angry reinterpretation of protest as performance art.


Saturday, 8 November—Film, Music & Poetic Turmoil

The second day opens with The Revolution Will Have Its Sky, a new cinepoem by M. Garcia Teutsch that explores resistance, vision and renewal in image and sound. A reprise of The Swallows of America deepens the piece's poetic message of protest.

The musical highlight of the evening is a live performance by SCANNER, who transforms Ginsberg's famous elegy into a multi-layered ritual of sound and light with ‘Elegy for Neal Cassady’. Scanner combines electronic soundscapes with live visuals by Antonio Pagano – a haunting fusion of poetry, performance and digital art that could only be created in Berlin.

Event details:

Date: 7–8 November 2025
Admission: from 7 p.m.
Location: Gallery Z22, Zähringerstraße 22, 10707 Berlin (U7 Konstanzer Straße)
Admission: free / donations welcome

About the festival

Since its inception in 2017, Speech is Not Free has celebrated the dialogue between literature, performance and political art. Each edition reinterprets the radical legacy of the Beat Generation – from Berlin's subculture to international networks of experimental art.

This year's theme, ‘Uncensored,’ challenges the romanticisation of the ‘American dream’ and revives the Beat tradition as a vibrant, global language of resistance.

From Henry Miller's Streets of Desillusion to Ginsberg's visionary protest poems, the festival embodies the spirit of rebellion and artistic reinvention that continues to shape Berlin's creative scene today.