To conclude her fellowship at the HAP Studio Programme (2021–2024), Joana Tischkau opened up her record archive and presented a selection of recordings that have had a decisive impact on her work thus far, in an exhibition at Basis Frankfurt (November 2024 to April 2025). Together with her longtime collaborator and sound designer Frieder Blume, she produced exclusive dubplates of his musical compositions.¹ They exemplify the artistic fusion of original material and reinterpretation.

ARCHIVE gives voice to the soundtracks of Tischkau’s stage productions. The exhibition brings together conceptual starting points, originals, samples, remixes, her own compositions, and visual references. It thus opens up a space where different layers of inspiration, transformation, and counter-narratives overlap and converse.
As a choreographer and director, Tischkau primarily works for the stage. Music and pop-cultural reference systems often form the backbone of her research-based development process and serve as a springboard for her creative work. The curation is guided by an interest in the aesthetic and formal aspects of practices based on appropriation and repetition. She is especially fascinated by the productive potential of “imperfect” or dilettantish forms of copying. Thematically, Tischkau renegotiates pop-cultural representations in relation to questions of race and gender in general, and of Black German identity in particular.

The archive includes music from the following stage works:
BEING PINK AIN'T EASY (2019)
KARNEVAL (2022)
BLACKROI (2023)
COLONASTICS (2023)
LAST NIGHT A DJ TOOK MY LIFE (2024)
ICH NEHM DIR ALLES WEG - EIN SCHLAGERBALLETT (2024)

Many of the original records come from the Deutsches Museum für Schwarze Unterhaltungskultur und Black Music (2020) and the Österreichisches Museum für Schwarze Unterhaltung (2022), supplementing the personal archive with a historically and culturally significant collection.

CONCEPT & ARTISTIC DIRECTION Joana Tischkau SOUND & COMPOSITION Frieder Blume