Volksbühne at Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz

With the P14 Youth Club, the Volksbühne already offers an established and highly sought-after youth cultural program with broad appeal. The existing programs reached a diverse range of youth groups and were already firmly embedded in the theater’s identity. With the NK Live initiative, the theater pursued a more decentralized and diversity-oriented approach—community-focused, cross-disciplinary, and with a clear emphasis on youth perspectives within the Neukölln community.

The project focused on developing a participatory live television channel where young people independently produce content about their district and neighborhood in Neukölln. To this end, a dedicated youth group was formed, which developed and jointly produced editorial formats under the professional guidance of filmmakers and artists.

The highlight of the project so far has been the development and production of the first episode of NK Live. During an intensive workshop phase, the participants acquired technical, practical filmmaking, and editorial skills and immediately put them into practice. This combination of learning and hands-on application strengthened the young people’s sense of ownership of the project and fostered a respectful, collaborative work culture within the highly diverse group.

The result was a sold-out live talk show featuring a short film, street interviews from Neukölln, and conversations with guests. At the same time, the newly renovated studio was inaugurated—a space modeled after a neighborhood convenience store that will serve as a creative set for future episodes.

NK Live has now become an integral part of the P14 Youth Theater and the Volksbühne. The project has fostered flexible, cross-departmental structures within the organization that facilitate close collaboration between internal teams and external partners. These new networks strengthen the project’s sustainability and help embed it firmly into the organization’s processes for the long term.

In addition, there is a clear institutional interest in continuing and further developing NK Live. The project expands the Volksbühne’s youth cultural work to include a decentralized, community-oriented, and media-art-based format, while also strengthening the theater’s connection to the urban space.