The Hamburg Kunsthalle is one of Germany’s most prestigious art museums. It houses seven centuries of European art, including Casper David Friedrich’s most famous painting, “Wanderer over the Sea of Fog”.
The museum is located in the heart of Hamburg, right next to its central train station – the city’s largest hotspot for homeless people. Being confronted with this reality on a daily basis moved the fine art museum to partner up with Hinz&Kunzt, Germany’s top street paper, to issue a wake-up call to Hamburg’s citizens and politicians in particular. As Hinz&Kunzt was celebrating its 30th anniversary, we decided to honour their trajectory by making it part of our creative process.
Painted by life and AI.
Life on the streets has an enormous impact on people and their stories. The Hamburg Kunsthalle helped 30 homeless people share their horrifying experiences to celebrate Hinz&Kunzt’s 30th anniversary.
Based on their life stories, the former or current Hinz&Kunzt sellers were able to create unique art pieces with the Hamburg Kunsthalle’s expertise and the help of AI. And now, we can all see their touching artwork and read the stories that inspired them.
The homeless artists got a chance to be seen and heard for the first time, thanks to the Hamburg Kunsthalle.
"I was about to jump into the river Elbe"
How survival artists became real artists.
The process
At first, we immersed ourselves in the lives of these homeless people in long, one-on-one conversations.
Their stories became an instruction template we developed with AI experts to feed the AIs DALL-E 2, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion. Once the systems provided their first interpretation, we invited each homeless person back to further develop their artwork along with the Hamburg Kunsthalle curators in a long iterative process that would help them express themselves in a way they would have never had access to without AI.
"It didn't come from my pen.
But from my mouth."
"The gallery, too, is homeless"
Like its homeless artists, the galleries lacked shelter, and the pictures were exposed to all kinds of weather. Underpasses, parks and department store canopies’ served as a backdrop that made their world even more tangible.
Pop-up galleries combining beauty and grief into an unforgettable experience that staged art where homeless people live.
The exhibitions also allowed visitors to buy merchandise or engage through QR codes leading them to the multimedia website, where they could donate and learn about the art and the artists.
"The red card is for the politicians, so they finally do something"
From live TV coverage of the Vernissage to The Homeless Gallery appearances on talk shows to radio and cinema spots, the galleries became the talk of the town. For further promotion and precise location details, we also ran a massive SoMe campaign between January and March 2023 on Instagram, Linkedin and Facebook. Plus hyper-localised DOOH drove people to the venues, where they had multiple opportunities to engage and act.
Behind the music of the homeless gallery
“Im Griff” (“The Devil’s Reign”), our project’s theme song, was created by a formerly homeless pop artist, Florian Künstler.
“I lived on the street myself for about half a year. There are so many stories behind people that we don’t know.” Florian Künstler on his Homelessness.
To manage the complexity of incorporating 30+ hours of interviews plus his own experiences into the lyrics, we also resorted to AI’s support.
After living and performing on the streets to survive, he launched his first single in 2020 under Columbia Records, and today his songs and videos have millions of listeners on Spotify and TikTok.
The artworks will be exhibited one last time at the Werner-Otto Hall of the Hamburg Kunsthalle when Christie’s auctions them off in the fall.
The Homeless Gallery doesn’t just raise awareness – it also provides financial relief when it’s most needed. Once Christie’s auctions the art pieces, 100% of the profits will go to Hinz&Kunzt to support the work of their long-term housing projects.
