In the late 1970s, many Namibians fled the war of independence against the South African occupation. Hundreds of children were sent into exile to protect them from the dangers of this conflict. Many of them were traumatised, malnourished or injured. The GDR, which saw itself as an ally of the South-West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO) in their fight for independence in the class struggle, took in 400 of them. The majority of the children grew up in Staßfurt near Magdeburg, largely isolated from the GDR population, learning German and attending school. Their contact with Africa was mostly cut off.

When Namibia gained independence in March 1990 and the GDR collapsed at the same time, the children’s situation changed abruptly. They were no longer welcome. In August 1990 – in some cases after a decade of living in the GDR and without being allowed to finish their education – they were flown back within a matter of days. Back to an environment that had long since become foreign to many of them.

The media in the GDR were firmly in the hands of the Party, they say. But what did creative filmmaking look like in the private sphere?

If you look more closely, you can find a subculture that differed distinctly from the high-gloss state productions – amateur filmmakers who worked differently, but quite professionally, who may not have been allowed to screen their films without restrictions in public but who did make them accessible within certain limits.

One of the best-known private filmmakers was the “filmmaking baker” Manfred Seifert, who realised his ideas with his own camera during and after the GDR era. His works were marked by a keen interest in technical possibilities and variations, and he taught himself the silhouette animation technique.