Audre Lorde – The Berlin Years 1984 to 1992 focuses on Audre Lorde’s relation to the German Black Diaspora, her literary as well as political influence, and is a unique visual document about the times the author spent in Germany. The film is also for coming generations a valuable historical document of German history, which tells about the development of an Afro-German movement and the origins of the anti-racist movement before and after the German reunification. The film relates the beginnings of these political debates and therefore facilitates a historical analysis and an understanding of present debates on identity and racism in Germany. For the first time, Dagmar Schultz’s archival video- and audio recordings and footage will be made available to a wide public. The film represents an important addition to the documentary “A Litany for Survival: The Life and Work of Audre Lorde“ by Ada Gray Griffin and Michelle Parkerson which was screened at the 45th Berlin Film Festival in 1995.

Realization:
Video- and audio recordings from different archival sources, poems and prose recited by Lorde, photos and interviews with contemporaries weave a lively image of the author in readings, discussions and in private moments. The connection to the present is being made in interviews with persons who knew Audre Lorde personally.

Utilization:

The documentary is to be presented worldwide at documentary festivals, gay-lesbian, queer, feminist and Black film festivals. It is to be offered to television stations with an artistic focus and to socio-cultural, political and academic events and seminars, and it will be distributed as a DVD. Third World Newsreel will distribute the film to the education market.