Archiv 451. Trikont Verlag

In the organizer's words:

The exhibition series "Archives in Residence" at the Archiv Galerie of the Haus der Kunst focuses on autonomous archives as alternative sites of knowledge production. After presentations of archival holdings of the Euward Archive, 2021 and the Forum Queeres Archiv München, 2022, the series will be continued in 2023 with testimonies of the subcultural awakening and anti-authoritarian protest movements with the "Archiv 451 / Trikont Verlag".

Trikont Verlag is one of the first autonomous publishing houses in the Federal Republic of Germany. Founded in Cologne in 1967 and active in Munich since 1968, Trikont opened up to alternative points of view and stimulated new social and ecological movements. The publishing house deliberately named itself after the Trikontinentale Konferenz (Tricontinental Conference), at which strategies against the discrimination of the so-called Third World were developed in Havana in 1966. Trikont Verlag published mainly German-language publications and translations on the European and regional workers' movements, decolonization and anti-fascism, alternative ways of life and radical social change. Among the publisher's first and most successful publications were the Mao Bible and Che Guevara's Bolivian Diary, which went through a total of eleven editions. Thus Trikont also developed into the starting point of the publishing house Frauenoffensive (1975), the first autonomous feminist publishing house in the FRG.

Trikont discovered the unifying power of music early on. In 1972, it began producing records under the name TRIKONT - Unsere Stimme, which later became Trikont Musikverlag, now Germany's oldest independent label.
Among the first records of Trikont Musikverlag is Arbeitersache München - Wir befreien uns selbst, which contains protest and struggle songs of "Arbeitersache München," to which the members of the Trikont publishing collective belonged. Another early release is the record Keine Macht für Niemand, probably Ton Steine Scherben's best-known album. In 1980, the book publisher and record label finally parted ways. After the book publisher filed for bankruptcy in 1986, former editor Christine Dombrowsky used the remaining publications and materials to build the Archive 451, whose name is a reference to the Truffaut film "Fahrenheit 451." In 2010, shortly before her death, she handed over her archive to the Archiv der Münchner Arbeiterbewegung e.V..

The exhibition brings together documents from Archive 451 and the archive holdings of Trikont - Unsere Stimme. One focus is on publishing publications and records, as well as posters, photographs and film footage. In addition to pieces of music, the multi-voiced exhibition also includes sound bites from actors, companions and artists.
These personal testimonies are brought together with the exhibits in terms of content and space, and form the soundtrack of the Trikont stories.

With thanks to the Archiv der Münchner Arbeiterbewegung e.V. and TRIKONT Unsere Stimme Verlags GmbH.
Direction and production of the audio stations: Kalle Aldis Laar
Scenography: Veronika Günther
Curated by Sabine Brantl