From September to December 2025, the heimaten Network organizes a decentralized festival with numerous events in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

heimaten Festival: What’s on?

essential

Strictly necessary

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Third party

Events

ausARTen is an interdisciplinary art and cultural festival in Munich that has been creating spaces for encounters, education, and shifting perspectives since 2016. The central focus is the radical diversity of a postmigrant society. Through exhibitions, performances, workshops, and discourse formats, the festival invites participants to interrogate social norms and discover new perspectives. Highlights such as the Jewish-Muslim Feminist Festival or the Transalpine Festival bring together local and transnational voices while making diversity visible in all its dimensions.

<a href="https://ausarten.org">Go to Website</a>

ausarten

ausARTen

Black Visual Grammar is a mobile cultural programme that uses collage and exhibition practices to center Black perspectives on diverse subjects and themes. Inspired by critical sociological methods such as photovoice and autoethnography, each edition of Black Visual Grammar begins with collage-making workshops followed by public exhibitions. Understanding Black perspectives as multilocal, intergenerational, and multicultural, the programme aims to create a visual archive that multiplies frames of reference, subjectivities, questions, and imaginative landscapes. Previous editions have explored spirituality, everyday moments in Black life, and alternative definitions of&nbsp;Heimat (home/homeland) through site-specific works, printed matter, and installations.

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Black Visual Grammar

The Brunnenpassage is a laboratory for transcultural art in Vienna’s Brunnenmarkt founded in 2007. Its programme ranges from theater, dance, music, exhibitions, to film. It emerged as a co-creation of professional artists and civil society actors and combines artistic practice with socio-political interrogations. Since 2021, the Brunnenpassage initiative&nbsp;Erinnern in Zukunft&nbsp;(Remembrance in Future) has employed transdisciplinary formats to address the question of what a contemporary, pluralistic memory culture should look like in a post-migrant society. One of its central visions is the reopening of a 500 square metre air-raid bunker from the Second World War under Vienna’s Yppenplatz as a space for pluralistic memory, research, and art.<a href="https://www.brunnenpassage.at" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Go to Website</a>

brunnenpassage

Brunnenpassage

Multilingual Radio in Halle and surroundings / Weşaneke pirziman&icirc; li radyoy&ecirc; ji bo Halle Saale &ucirc; derdora w&ecirc; / راديو متعدد اللغات لهالى والضواحي المجاورة / Une Radio multilingue pour Halle et ses alentours / رادیو چند زبانه برای هاله و حومه / Mehrsprachiges Radio f&uuml;r Halle und Umgebung

Common Voices Radio is a project for multilingualism on the community radio CORAX in Halle/Saale. It aims to bring together a plurality of voices and make the migration society audible.

Common Voices Radio gives people with a migration background a voice and trains them in radio journalism. Every week a multilingual program is produced based on questions and topics that are important for refugees and migrants&mdash;from the studio and on the road. Every Thursday from 15:00 to 17:00 on Radio Corax 95.9 FM, at&nbsp;<a href="http://www.radiocorax.de">Radio Corax</a>, and on many other community radio stations.

<a href="https://commonvoices.radiocorax.de/">Go to Website</a>

common-voices-radio

Common Voices Radio

The Koordinierungsstelle zur Dekolonisierung Berlins (Coordinating Branch for Decolonizing Berlin) is an unusual project, hosted at the offices of Decolonize Berlin e. V. In 2020, the Koordinierungsstelle was commissioned by Berlin&rsquo;s Abgeordnetenhaus (State Parliament) to reappraise Berlin&rsquo;s colonial past in tandem with civil society stakeholders, political bodies, and administrators. Through a participatory process, a comprehensive catalogue of interventions was drafted in realms ranging from education, the sciences, urban space, memory culture, to international collaborations. After a resolution was passed by the Berlin Senate in 2023 to adopt a citywide Aufarbeitungskonzept (reappraisal concept) towards Berlin&rsquo;s colonial past, Decolonize Berlin has overseen the implementation. For decades, the association&rsquo;s member organizations have advocated for the recognition of colonial injustices and for society-wide decolonization.

<a href="https://decolonize-berlin.de">Go to Website</a>

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Decolonize Berlin e. V.

The Coalition for Pluralistic Public Discourse (CPPD) is a collaborative network and productive platform of around ninety artists, academics, journalists, and activists working on and researching pluralistic cultures of remembrance through a broad range of approaches. The network&rsquo;s goal is to create artistic, civicl society, and education-politicalal policy concepts for pluralistic remembrance. At the heart of this work is the conviction that those who seek to shape the present and future in a way that recognises the pluralism of societies must also provide a new telling of the past. It brings together, among others, the remembrance policy concerns of Sinti*, Roma* and many other communities, plural-Jewish, postcolonial and anti-racist discourses, as well as migrant-diaspora and queer-feminist perspectives.

<a href="https://cppdnetwork.com/en/">Go to Website</a>

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DialoguePerspectives e. V. & Coalition for Pluralistic Public Discourse

As a Black and community-based organization, Each One Teach One e. V. (EOTO) advocates for the empowerment of people of African descent (PAD) in Germany and beyond. EOTO&rsquo;s work began in 2014 with a neighbourhood library run by volunteers featuring 1,500 books by authors of African descent. Since then, the library has grown to house a unique collection of over 8,000 titles, accessible via an online public catalogue. Based in the so-called African Quarter, Berlin&rsquo;s former colonial district, EOTO offers an empowering counter-narrative for the PAD community and society as a whole through cultural events, youth outreach, anti-discrimination counselling, and advocacy. In addition to its various projects, EOTO is currently focusing on the development of a community centre for Black, African, and Afro-diasporic individuals in Berlin.

<a href="https://eoto-archiv.de">Go to Website</a>

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Each One Teach One e. V.

fluxus&sup2; e. V. is a non-profit association based in Hamburg that promotes cultural participation, post-migrant perspectives, and socialpolitical discourses. As sponsor of the fluctoplasma festival, Hamburg&rsquo;s largest interdisciplinary festival for art, diversity, and memory culture, fluxus&sup2; e. V. develops projects that amplify multi-sited narratives and make marginalized voices visible.

<a href="https://fluctoplasma.com">Go to Website</a>

fluctoplasma

The FORUM STADTPARK is a space for the production and presentation of contemporary art in all its forms, organized by an independent association in Graz.

It understands itself as a hospitable open house, an artistic and political laboratory, a space for arguments, a fortress of powerlessness, or a protective space&mdash;all depending on what&rsquo;s needed at that moment. What unifies its projects is the effort to treat burning issues of our time with political belligerence and social and political creativity.

<a href="https://forumstadtpark.at">Go to Website</a>

forum-stadtpark

Forum Stadtpark

The FWT: Freies Werkstatt Theater has been a venue for artistic and social debate in Cologne since 1977. At the intersection of theatre, performance, and discourse, it creates spaces for new perspectives, exchange, and collective reflection on contemporary challenges. With its&nbsp;Focus on: series, the FWT: addresses global crises and processes of social transformation while the&nbsp;Foyer &amp; Flamme format fosters dialogue with the city’s wider communities. Bringing together discussions, a communal courtyard canteen, and concerts, it encourages informal encounters. Art is understood here as a social practice that makes solidarity tangible, brings different perspectives into dialogue, and creates a space within the theatre for marginalized communities.<a href="https://www.fwt-koeln.de" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Go to website</a>

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FWT: Köln

globale&deg; &ndash; Festival for Border-Crossing Literature in Bremen and Bremerhaven was founded in 2007. It is organised by the Verein Globale e. V. in close coordination with the University of Bremen, Theater Bremen, and a variety of other institutions including Radio Bremen, Instituto Cervantes, Institut fran&ccedil;ais, Stadtbibliothek Bremen, Prager Literaturhaus, Bremer Literaturkontor, and the Mus&eacute;e de l&rsquo;histoire de l&rsquo;immigration Paris. The invited authors are all multilingual, and the guests include writers from across the world who have been inspired to create linguistic adventures and exciting stories through experiences of transnational journeys. This format makes the festival unique within Europe, offering a forum for the broad diversity of literatures that affect the German-speaking realm, whether linguistically, culturally, or topographically. The festival understands itself as a dialogue between cultures and consciously addresses contemporary debates surrounding diversity and integration.

<a href="https://globale-literaturfestival.de">Go to Website</a>

globale-festival-fuer-grenzueberschreitende-literatur

globale° – Festival for Border-Crossing Literature

glokal e. V. is a Berlin-based education and consulting association that challenges discourses of power and has been committed to political education among youth and adults since 2006.

Our work focuses on North-South relations, which we believe continue to be shaped by colonial histories as well as asymmetric, racialised relations of power that arise from them. Our work therefore takes a decolonial perspective towards global, domestic, and interpersonal relationships that is critical of existing power structures.

glokal realizes a variety of projects, designs publications, conceives educational material, and is embedded in development policy and decolonial networks.

<a href="https://glokal.org">Go to Website</a>

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glokal e. V.

Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW) is dedicated to the search for strategies for better coexistence in and with this world. How can cultures of conviviality and community be cultivated and carried forward? With a focus on diverse voices and encounters, HKW brings together different understandings of the world in artistic, discursive, and activist forms.

Visitors are invited to experience various forms of collaboration in the extraordinary architecture of the Congress Hall, which was built in 1957 &ndash; whether in exhibitions, sound/music, performances, discursive events, literature and oraliture, architecture, academic and cultural discourse formats or in other types of gatherings.

The programme focuses on migrant knowledge and the diverse stories and life realities that can be articulated today from Germany through international exchange. Berlin alone is home to citizens from 170 nations. These people and their communities are of fundamental importance for the direction taken by HKW &ndash; not only as subjects or audiences, but also as co-makers of the programme. It is both a key goal and a mission to make cultures tangible and not to present or merely exhibit them as &ldquo;others.&rdquo;

HKW thus expands the concept of the &ldquo;world&rdquo; in its name towards an understanding of the world that embraces, explores, and equally respects a multiplicity of cultures, orders of knowledge and ways of being &ndash; whether of living or non-living beings.

<a href="https://hkw.de/en/">To the Website</a>

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Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW)

To Remember Means to Change

At rallies, vigils, and funerals after the racist murders in Hanau on 19 February 2020, we made a promise: The names of the victims will not be forgotten. We will not leave things alone. We will not remain shocked and dismayed with no consequences. . . . We will not allow 19 February 2020 to be swept under the rug, as countless rightwing murders have been before.

&ndash; From the founding text of the Initiative 19. Februar Hanau, 6 March 2020

Relatives of the victims, survivors of the attack, friends, and supporters have made the space of the Initiative 19. Februar Hanau into a site of trust, remembrance, justice, education, and consequences.

<a href="https://19feb-hanau.org">Go to Website</a>

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Initiative 19. Februar Hanau

The Karlstorbahnhof was opened in 1995 and offers a diverse cultural programme with creative concepts, artists, and openness. As an educational institution, it values cultural work that&rsquo;s open to diversity and critical of power. In 2022, it moved out of the old Heidelsberg train station building to the S&uuml;dstadt district, where the new venue features a large hall, the TiK theatre space, a club, a movie theatre, seminar rooms plus a foyer, event rooms, and a bar/caf&eacute;. The Karlstorbahnhof is one of the region&rsquo;s largest cultural institutions and offers a broad programme year-round aimed at all age groups. Over 100,000 visitors come annually to see concerts, plays, films, readings, cabaret, workshops, and more.

<a href="https://Karlstorbahnhof.de">Go to Website</a>

karlstorbahnhof-heidelberg

Karlstorbahnhof Heidelberg

Korea Verband is a non-profit organization that emerged in 1990 from the democracy and solidarity movement for Korea. We use a variety of forms of action to campaign for human and civil rights, both in divided Korea, in Europe, and locally in the neighborhood. We question power structures from a post-colonial, feminist, and intersectional perspective and work with different target groups such as young people, adults, activists, multipliers, and political decision-makers. We are active in a variety of alliances and have a large network. One focus of their work is providing information and education about the &lsquo;comfort women&rsquo; as well as forced prostitution and sexualised violence. In September 2020, Korea-Verband erected a Peace Statue in Berlin-Moabit and is currently fighting to preserve it.

<a href="https://koreaverband.de/en">Go to Website</a>

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Korea-Verband e. V.

The Kunstwerkst&auml;tten Greifswald (Greifswald Art Workshops) are one of nine open-enrollment youth art schools in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The Kunstwerkst&auml;tten see themselves as a living training ground&mdash;a laboratory full of inspiration that offers room for growth. Art isn&rsquo;t the end goal so much as a tool for self-expression, self-discovery, and connection. With a total of 52 semester courses, weekend workshops, and school and daycare projects, the Kunstwerkst&auml;tten have developed artistic strategies in disciplines ranging from painting and graphic design, dance and theatre, textile art and carpentry, ceramics and plastics, to media art and animation. The offerings are managed by the association Kunstwerkst&auml;tten e. V. and financed with funding from the State Government of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the city of Greifswald, course fees, and donations. The Kunstwerkst&auml;tten have been active in Greifswald and the surrounding region since 2000. They received state recognition in 2010 and will celebrate their 25th anniversary this year.

<a href="https://kunst-werkstaetten.de">Go to Website</a>

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Kunstwerkstätten Greifswald

For over ten years, the Rechenzentrum (RZ) has been a site for art, culture, and participation in the heart of Potsdam’s inner city. Today, over 300 people use the former data processing centre for creative work, sociocultural encounters, and civic engagement. The projects, studios, and initiatives housed here contribute significantly to the city’s diversity, liveliness, and openness.The RZ’s architectural surroundings are also impressive: the East German building with its landmark-protected mosaics stands directly beside the recently renovated baroque tower of Potsdam’s former Garrison Church. Here, German history is visible in all its complexity—in its contrast, dialogue, and tension.<a href="https://rz-potsdam.de/">Go to Website</a>

rechenzentrum-potsdam

Rechenzentrum Potsdam

RomaTrial e. V. is an award-winning self-organization of Roma and non-Roma people who fight antiziganism (racism against Sinti and Roma people) through art. The association works on theater, film, and education projects, and has staged events such as the Roma Biennales of 2018 and 2021 as well as the International Festival of Romani Film AKE DIKHEA?, which has run since 2017. RomaTrial also organizes a commemorative ceremony held annually at the Memorial to the Sinti and Roma of Europe Murdered Under National Socialism. In 2022, Theatertreffen der Jugend (theatre meeting of the youth), invited the RomaTrial group WIR SIND HIER! to take part in the Theatertreffen. Since 2022, the group has independently operated the Gr&uuml;ner Salon at the Volksb&uuml;hne on Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz in Berlin.

<a href="https://romatrial.org/ ">Go to Website</a>

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RomaTrial e. V.

Since July 2021, the serial SchUM sites in Speyer, Worms, and Mainz have been part of the UNESCO World Heritage List. These exceptional historical and archaeological monuments, along with the writings of significant Jewish teachers and rabbis, are considered the cradle of Ashkenazi Judaism and are uniquely well-preserved testimonies to a living Jewish tradition.

To communicate this historical inheritance, the city of Worms is planning to build a World Heritage Visitor and Information Center in the Neumarkt, a central area in Worms&rsquo;s inner city. Until the center&rsquo;s completion, events will be held regularly at the SchUM-Lab, an empty storefront beside the Neumarkt.

<a href="https://schumstaedte.de/en" target="_blank">Go to Website</a>

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SchUM-Städte e. V.

The Sinti Union Schleswig-Holstein was founded in 2017 by Sinti descendants of Holocaust survivors and victims. It began public advocacy in the summer of 2021, and today numbers among the most visible self-organized associations of Sinti and Roma in Germany. Its work, predominantly carried out on a volunteer basis, is recognized across Germany and includes education of the majority society on Sinti and Roma history, empowerment, counselling, culture of remembrance, cultural funding, social media, political education, and networking. Additionally, the Sinti Union Schleswig-Holstein advises various political committees of the Schleswig-Holstein federal state parliament on issues relating to Sinti and Roma people.

<a href="https://sintiunionsh.com">Go to Website</a>

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Sinti Union Schleswig-Holstein e. V.

The Stadtgalerie Saarbr&uuml;cken promotes contemporary art and culture. Its diverse exhibitions are available for visitors to experience year-round, free of charge. Located at the centre of Saarbr&uuml;cken, the Stadtgalerie is active throughout the city.

Since 2021, Katharina Ritter has designed the Stadtgalerie as a site of critical confidence. Through a varied programme of exhibitions and projects, she has invited numerous participants to develop visions for desirable futures that open up new spaces of possibility. The Stadtgalerie contributes to Saarbr&uuml;cken&rsquo;s diversity, alongside artists, cultural creators, and participants with a wide range of experiences and qualifications.

A further focus of the Stadtgalerie is to provide intergenerational art education for schools and extracurricular programs in tandem with collaborative partners and the Netzwerk kulturelle Bildung (Network of Cultural Educators).

<a href="https://stadtgalerie-saarbruecken.de">Go to Website</a>

stadtgalerie-saarbruecken

Stadtgalerie Saarbrücken

The Theaterhaus Jena, founded in 1993, is known for its unusual receptivity to experimentation and its young ensemble. Over the years it has been hailed as an aesthetic laboratory, a springboard for young artists, and a pioneering theatrical model at the boundary between the independent scene and municipally funded theatre. The focus is contemporary art: world premieres are as central to the repertoire as modern adaptations of classics and performance theatre. Theatrical work with young people plays a major part in the repertoire, as does the introduction of children to theatre. Since the 2024&ndash;25 season, the artistic direction has increasingly emphasized democratization of theatrical structures and the expansion of national and international collaborations.

<a href="http://theaterhaus-jena.de ">Go to Website</a>

theaterhaus-jena

Theaterhaus Jena

WERTansich(t) is an interdisciplinary collective that supports organizations, teams, and individuals in anchoring democratic values and sustainable processes of change into their associations. It works with artist residencies, cultural centres, museums, festivals, educational institutions, administrations, ministries, unions, and corporations to create spaces for democratic exchange, intercultural dialogue, conflict- and democracy-ready organizations, and structures that are sensitive to discrimination. WERTansich(t) merges systemic and theater-pedagogy approaches with perspectives from science, art, and culture to make conflict, democracy, and social transformation tangible.

<a href="https://www.wertansicht.de">Go to Website</a>

wertansicht

WERTansich(t)

The W.I.R. Werdau Initiative Against Racism was founded out of personal concern and in response to the escalating climate of right-wing violence against refugees and migrants in Germany since 2016. Our work focuses on the small Saxon town of Werdau and, by extension, the Zwickau region. Through educational and cultural events and projects—such as creative workshops, film screenings, student projects, festivals, concerts, panel discussions, and more—we create inclusive opportunities and open spaces for interaction. Through our projects, we build alliances and empower marginalized individuals and those who stand in solidarity with them. At the same time we inspire and encourage young people in particular to think critically and act autonomously. We take a stand against hate and exclusion while advocating for social diversity, solidarity, openness, and mutual respect.<a href="http://wir-lautstark.de" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Go to Website</a>

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W.I.R. Werdauer Initiative gegen Rassismus e. V.

zwischentext is a post-migrant, multilingual, and interdisciplinary collective that writes, publishes, and curates literary and artistic formats dedicated to making marginalized perspectives visible. Using participatory practices, zwischentext creates spaces for exchange, cooperation, and new narration. Through its publications, events, workshops, and performative and theatrical formats, the collective strives to shape the Swiss literary and cultural landscape from a post-migrant perspective. It works with both cultural institutions as well as spaces that are self-organized, temporary, and independent. In doing so it brings together authors, artists, and communities while creating access to literature and art that facilitates dialogue, joint learning, and collective knowledge production.

zwischentext

The heimaten Network is an initiative of <a href="http://hkw.de/en" target="_blank">Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW)</a> in the frame of heimaten.

heimaten is supported by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media due to a ruling of the German Bundestag.

hkw-heimaten

Das&nbsp;heimaten&nbsp;Netzwerk bringt Akteur*innen der pluralen Gesellschaft zusammen &ndash; aus Deutschland, &Ouml;sterreich und der Schweiz.

The heimaten Network brings together actors from the plural society—from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

heimaten Festival: the Network

The&nbsp;heimaten&nbsp;Network&nbsp;brings together actors from the plural society&mdash;from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.&nbsp;Since 2024, the network has included the following partners.

heimaten&nbsp;means opening spaces, creating a home for oneself, and insisting that this home has always been shaped collectively by many people.

heimaten stands for the idea that a society draws strength from its plurality; that commitment, vitality, art, and culture arise from a diversity of voices; and that this also encompasses debate, criticism, and dialogue.

From September to November 2026, the second edition of the&nbsp;heimaten Festival for Plural Democracy brings together numerous protagonists and initiatives who have committed themselves to this attitude and collectively claim space and visibility in the face of current political developments.

News about the decentralized heimaten Festival for Plural Democracy, organized by numerous civil society actors and initiatives

heimaten Festival: News

News

From September to December 2025, the decentralized heimaten Festival celebrates the collective power of civil society in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

heimaten Festival for Plural Democracy

heimaten Website

In the anniversary edition of its literary magazine, the zwischentext collective is tackling the theme of&nbsp;heimat/home 2.0. Inspired by the issue, Mërgim Gutaj and the authors Andrea Rea Arežina, Nida Temaj, and Sara Kišević will pursue the question of what&nbsp;Heimat can still mean today while interrogating how a concept that’s traditionally anchored in geography can be reimagined in a pluralistic way. In a kitchen table reading format, personal texts and performative elements will come together to create a polyphonic examination of belonging, identity, and the limits of the concept of&nbsp;Heimat.&nbsp;Featuring Andrea Rea Arežina, Nida Temaj, and Sara Kišević Artistic direction and moderation: Mërgim Gutaj

NETWORK

CALENDAR

NEWS

Title: heimat/home 2.0: A Theatrical Reading