Helen Neikes

Dresden is famous for its attempt to meticulously reconstruct its once bombed-out historical center and bring the colorful baroque settings of the 18th century back to life. It’s infamous for the right-wing-surge that has since 2015 swept the city and made it a center of far-right activity in Germany and Europe. This film is an exploration of where the two intersect.

The Great Dismal Swamp: an uninhabitable wasteland, covering parts of Virginia and North Carolina. A treacherous den of poisonous water snakes, blood-sucking insects, spiders and predators like black bears and lynxes. But some had no other option except braving these dangers, like fugitive slaves, who needed a way to escape the cruelty of their white masters.

Already as a student of the Art Academy in Dusseldorf, Otto Modersohn, born in 1865, rebelled against the teachings of his professors and placed his own natural philosophy at the center of his artistic work. He declared himself a landscape painter. His unmistakable style testifies to simplicity and inwardness. In Teufelsmoor in northern Germany, he finally founded the artists' colony Worpswede, where his work reached its peak.