Speech is Not Free VII

About the Festival: Berlin, November 7–8, 2025 — Gallery Z22 (Zähringerstraße 22, Wilmersdorf) and Poet Republik presents the seventh edition of Speech is Not Free, a two-day festival uniting international and Berlin-based artists in an exploration of poetry, performance, and multimedia sound.

The event transforms one of the city’s most vibrant independent galleries into a site of radical imagination, where avant-garde art and political expression meet.

Through live performance, cinepoetry, and experimental soundscapes, Speech is Not Free VII reclaims the rebellious energy of the Beat Generation — reinterpreting its visionary legacy through the lens of Berlin’s contemporary art scene.

Doors open at 19:00. Admission is free with donation suggested.

Friday, November 7 — Voices of Dissent

The festival opens with Uahuu Tujendapi, whose electrifying vocal performance sets the tone for a night of border-crossing expression.

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

Throughout the evening, video installations inspired by Allen Ginsberg’s Fall of America create an immersive audiovisual meditation.

The night closes with The Swallows of America: A Poem Protest in One Act, starring Anna Bănică, a fierce, lyrical reimagining of protest as performance art.

Saturday, November 8 — SCANNER! Film, Music & Poetic Revolt

Day two continues with The Revolution Will Have Its Sky, a cinepoem by M. Garcia Teutsch, exploring resistance, vision, and renewal.

An encore of The Swallows of America expands its poetic protest into collective experience.

The evening culminates with a special live performance by SCANNER, presenting “Elegy for Neal Cassady” — Allen Ginsberg’s elegy transformed into a multi-sensory ritual of sound and light.

Scanner’s signature electronic compositions merge with Antonio Pagano’s live visuals, creating a haunting fusion of poetry, performance, and digital art — a distinctly Berlin encounter between literature and club culture.

Event Details

Dates: November 7–8, 2025

Doors Open: 19:00

Venue: Gallery Z22, Zähringerstraße 22, 10707 Berlin (U7 Konstanzer Straße)

Admission: Free / Donations welcome

About the Festival

Founded in 2015, Speech is Not Free celebrates the ongoing dialogue between literature, performance, and political art. Each edition reimagines the Beat Generation’s radical legacy in contemporary contexts — from Berlin’s subcultural stages to international experimental art networks.

This year’s theme, “Uncensored”, confronts the sanitized myths of the “American dream” and reclaims the Beat tradition as a living, global language of dissent.

From Henry Miller’s highways of disillusionment to Ginsberg’s visionary protest poems, the festival channels the spirit of rebellion and reinvention that continues to define Berlin’s creative underground.

Also check out other Arts events in Berlin, Festivals in Berlin, Literary Art events in Berlin.