Niklas Maak, arts editor for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, a German daily newspaper, was born in Hamburg. Now, he’s well aware of the best of Berlin’s “culture of misuse,” as he calls it, a culture he also sees in Los Angeles, where car dealerships can be transformed to galleries. “Take Berlin clubs on the 18th floors of GDR office buildings, where you find the most interesting clubs,” he said during the panel. “You can see the sunrise in the morning if you stay up all night.” Read more about Maak below.
Q. What music have you listened to today?
A. I was listening to a French singer called Berry, and a French band called Poni Hoax, they have a new album called Images of Sigrid. Then a 1969 album by Serge Gainsbourg.
Q. What is your favorite word?
A. Hello.
Q. What is the last thing that inspired you?
A. In a positive way? As a critic you can be inspired by negative things. What inspired me was a chair by Konstantin Grcic, in a very good way.
Q. When you were a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
A. Either a writer or an architect.
Q. What is your favorite cocktail?
A. A classic gin and tonic.
Q. What is your greatest extravagance?
A. A car.
Q. If you could take only one more journey, where would you go?
A. Ghana.
Q. What profession would you like to practice in your next life?
A. Same.
Q. What is your favorite thing about Los Angeles?
A. Driving in a Tesla from Santa Monica to Malibu.
Q. What is your most prized material possession?
A. An Albert Camus book, an original.
Q. Who is the one person living or dead whom you would most like to meet for a drink?
A. Can it be a group? Can I compose this group? The architect Eupalinos, Le Corbusier, Serge Gainsbourg. This group thing is a terrible thing I’ve started, I have to keep going. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Coco Chanel, and Chan Marshall. That’s the group.
To read more about Maak’s panel on Los Angeles and Berlin, click here.
*Photo by Aaron Salcido.