Euro 2024 was the hook, using immersive digital storytelling, amazing photography, and compelling essays curated by The Culture Division, Gegenpresse, and Fußball-Woche as bait, to reel us into Berlin’s radical football culture.
It’s lunchtime the day after the second Euro 2024 semi-final, Netherlands 1-2 England, and I’ve Ubered to The Berlin Edition exhibition at OPEN space in Berlin to meet some of the curators – Fußball-Woche partner Kilian Depuhl and Gegenpresse creative director Jack de la Mare. “All the good stuff from Theo is gone,” admits Depuhl running me through the sparse rails of upcycled Four football club tops. Open for the last two weeks of the tournament, they’ve been really busy judging by their Instagram feeds but things are definitely winding down, looking around at the candid photography across the back wall, foosball table, and stacked independent magazine rack housing OOF, Glory, Gegenpresse, and Fußball-Woche issues. Last night’s dramatic result has left us split on who the eventual Euro 2024 winners will be. “As an Australian, my fellow countrymen will revoke my passport for this but: It’s Coming Home,” predicts de la Mare, whereas Depuhl believes that “Spain is doing the job!”
Napoli winning their long-awaited third Scudetto last year sparked the first instalment of The Culture Division’s immersive digital storytelling series, Editions: a holistic exploration of a city’s football culture. Transporting viewers straight into the heart and passion of Naples via eight original essays, an online gallery showcasing local photographers, and a playlist chosen by local artists on a well-designed website felt fresh and looked impressive. Such layered and human creative content immediately stands out in a sea of surface-level, algorithm-dictated clickbait. Even though I didn’t meet founder and creative director Luke Taylor and editorial director Liam Miller at OPEN in person, their brilliant ability to pass the mic to platform local experts and creatives, and the overwhelming authenticity of their endeavour, shone through.
Photographer Vittorio Moro
Photographer Alessandro Ametta
Photographer Alessandro Ametta
The step up and project expansion between instalments one and two is clear from the addition of two major local collaborators – legendary Berlin football newspaper Fußball-Woche and Berlin-based football magazine Gegenpresse. Nothing about The Berlin Edition was over-promised but the trio of collaborators still over-delivered. Online, they dropped interviews with World Cup winner Ariane Hingst and Hertha Berlin fan-favourite Jonjoe Kenny; a photography display spotlighting Pia Henkel, Ryu Voelkel and more of the city’s best football photographers; guest essays by acclaimed writer Musa Okwonga and more, and artwork. Offline, a vernissage event launched the project in April before this physical exhibition of highlights at OPEN in July.
“The production of The Berlin Edition began in October last year. With the Euros on the horizon, we thought it would be the perfect place to explore the city’s subcultures in a way that hasn’t really been done before,” explains Miller later over email. “For a city with 100s of clubs – big and small – each as distinctive and unique as the next, we knew we needed to find voices that best represented its complex makeup.” The beauty of launching The Berlin Edition in April, before periodically dropping content online until June, meant the creators could really enjoy Euro 2024 in their city. Fans worldwide could enhance their experience drawing on the trio’s progressive vision; in fact the content is evergreen and special enough to transcend the tournament altogether.
Below, the collaborators tell SoccerBible how Euro 2024 was the hook, using immersive digital storytelling, amazing photography, and compelling essays curated by The Culture Division, Gegenpresse, and Fußball-Woche as bait, to reel us into Berlin’s radical football culture.
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Let’s start with The Culture Division – tell us what you do and why you do it?
Luke Taylor (LT): “Liam and I look to unearth and tell real stories from football culture authentically – something we thought was missing in the scene before starting The Culture Division. We were born out of the need to tell unique stories and break through the noise, which remains our creative focus to this day, combining distinctive characters and creatives with a strong brand direction. We look to harness football as a lens for culture and lifestyle.”
Why did The Culture Division, Gegenpresse, and Fußball-Woche decide to collaborate on this?
Liam Miller (LM): “We were fans of Gegen and Fußball-Woche (FuWo) for a long time. As soon as we decided that Berlin was the focus of this project, we had to get them on board. From the first time we all spoke, I knew that we could create something really unique. It’s amazing what a simple phone call can lead to!”
Kilian Depuhl (KD): “Yes, we are always on the lookout for creative partners with the same values and ideas. You could say that after our first call, we were already on the same page and excited about its potential. For us, it was especially important to establish a connection between the two nations, which ultimately have so much in common – not just mutual respect and a love of football, but so much more.”
Photographer Jack de la Mare
Photographer Jack de la Mare
Photographer Kasimir Weichert
Can you define your connection with football and how it’s expressed within this project?
LM: “Football is a lens for culture. It’s one of the few remaining cultural exchanges that is truly collective by its very nature. It has been battered and bruised by corporatisation and commercialisation, even weaponised for political gain. Our vision of the game seeks to preserve its cultural core: the thing that connects a fan to a club for decades, builds friendships, overcomes barriers, and empowers communities. If you look throughout this project, that vision is front and centre.”
KD: “Fußball-Woche (Football Week) is a real cultural heritage site in the capital. After 100 years of absolute dedication to the beautiful game, football maniacs and lovers of Berlin alike regard FuWo as the leading medium for football in the capital – with a unique status in Europe. We know the clubs, people, unique pieces, and places and we are very proud to present these specialities to others, especially non-Berliners.
“With over four million inhabitants, Berlin is home to more than 390 clubs and over 205,000 organised club members. Bringing together this melting pot of clubs, teams, athletes and fans into one medium is almost an impossible mission. But FuWo does it every week.”
Jack de la Mare (JD): “I grew up in a country where football isn’t the main sport, and realised when I moved to Germany that football is an incredible platform for creativity. I’ve dived as far into football culture as I can since moving here and I try to document it via art, photography, or writing. Gegen is the result of all of that, and I’ve tried to support the guys here creatively when and where I can.”
How did the physical showcases follow on from and differ from the digital exhibition?
KD: “The digital exhibition is larger, and reaches a more international audience, for sure. But we always wanted to make sure that everyone in Berlin, especially those who contributed, could enjoy the project in person too. The real exchange of ideas has a different connection, and it has been great to bring together and meet a new wave of creative people in the city. It has started something that we hope can continue.
“When we first got together, we said to ourselves: ‘Interviews and photo stories are great, but let’s really let it rip and create something that can bring people together in the end.’ We celebrated the launch of the digital exhibition, which featured all our stories and interviews, with a vernissage event in April, hosted by our friends at Herrlich Dining in Neukölln. We wanted it to feel like the clubhouse you might attend after a local amateur game, surrounded by photography from the project, with a nice drink in hand. Thanks to OPEN SPACE and HY.AM Studios – the owners of the space in Berlin Mitte – we were able to bring the project to life again with a longer-lasting exhibition of the project’s photography and other elements.”
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Kasimir Weichert
Photographer Kasimir Weichert
Which piece/element are you proudest of and why?
LM: “Being able to publish a wonderful essay by Musa Okwonga on his time with SFCF Inter (otherwise known as The Unicorns) was a real privilege. He’s an incredible writer and an inspirational figure. On a personal note, interviewing Hertha Berlin’s Jonjoe Kenny was also a highlight.”
KD: “Personally, it was an honour to meet and interview Ariane Hingst. I mean – when do you ever meet a four-time European champion and two-time world champion? That's something very special and of course, you listen with wide eyes and ears.”
JD: “I find it difficult to choose a standalone piece. Standing in front of Hertha’s Ostkurve to photograph a silent match between Hertha BSC and Fortuna Düsseldorf out of respect for Hertha’s President, Kai Bernstein, who had passed away just days earlier, was one of the most unique and moving experiences I’ve had in a football stadium.”
What do you want people to take away from The Berlin Edition?
LM: “The great thing about collaborating in this way is that we’ve managed to bring together different audiences: both our own readers in the UK and beyond and Berliners who are interested in what the project is exploring within the city. The feedback has been amazing. It’s given a platform to smaller clubs, shone a light on different subcultures, and even brought rival fans together to celebrate the city’s love for football.”
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
The Gegenpresse watch parties looked epic on Instagram. How did they go down and what was the thinking behind the fab artwork?
JD: “The parties are a continuation of what we started at the 2021 Euros and that is, essentially, to create a welcoming and inclusive space where anyone can feel at home watching the football. Our crowd is amazing, they get raucous when the moment calls for it, but ultimately foster an environment that feels so friendly and approachable for anyone to come in and take part. We made a joke about putting ‘no wankers’ on the promotion poster but it really has worked. Shoutout to the self-aware wankers, I guess.
“As for the artwork, these are very much thrown together last minute for the feed. It’s whatever I’m feeling in that moment – sometimes that’ll be a group of German guys sitting around a barbecue in Gijon during the 1982 World Cup with their Germany Flag photoshopped to the Pride Flag. Other times it’s Bukayo Saka riding a unicorn with a bunch of weird-ass vaporwave graphics behind him. We all absorb so much content daily, I just want people to get a little chuckle out of whatever we’re putting out.”
What’s your take on Creative Soccer Culture?
LT: “The main focus of creativity in football has to be based on fostering community and harnessing that as the main driver. From there, it’s all about unearthing stories, connecting with extraordinary people and authentically sharing it with the world. Creative Soccer Culture should benefit society through many different initiatives, amplify creativity, and tell stories born from the correct motives. It’s a unified approach to drive art and culture within a sport and is a wonderful chance to cultivate an evergreen and positive space.
LM: “It makes sense to shout out all the writers, photographers and contributors who helped make this project as vibrant and impactful as it has been. You can find them all on our website.”
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Up next…
LM: “More vibrant and impactful stories (in new formats) straight from the core of football culture. We’re hoping to have something really unique and typical of our work up to this point to announce shortly, but we’re keeping our cards close to our chest on that right now.”
KD: “We are launching a unique media app at the start of the season – especially for Berlin football. Articles, news, trends and results. From the smallest league to the biggest. There we have a greater opportunity to showcase local football and its communities in a new way. For example, women's football will be positioned more strongly. Street football is also special in Berlin, which we will accompany alongside the normal league media.”
JD: “A cold beer on a Greek beach, but after I’ll continue to build Gegen the brand. More events, collaborations and some merch drops. Linking with more Berlin based creatives in the music and fashion spaces, I have some ideas. We just started Gegen Running Club, which has been fun getting Gegen’s toes wet in a new sport entirely as well.”
Photographer Pia Henkel
Photographer Pia Henkel
Banner image credit
Photographer Mitch Noakes
Project partners and photographers
@theculturedivision (Partner)
@fussball_woche (Partner)
@gegenpresse (Partner)
@jack.delamare (Founder of Gegenpresse & Photographer)
@pia.henkel (Photo)
@kasimir.weichert (Photo)
@mitch.noakes (Photo)
@alessandroametta (Photo)
@hyamstudiosberlin (Partner)
@openspace.berlin (Partner)
@herrlich.dining (Partner)
@vittoriomoro (Photo)
