[Club Portrait]: Artheater (Cologne)

 

 

Some basic facts

Who are you?: Stefan Bohne

Owner: I am the owner and CEO 😉

Where: Ehrenfeldgürtel 127, 50823 Cologne (Germany)

Former locations: none

Capacity: 800 (300, 200, 100)

Floors: 3 (Mainfloor, Basement, Bar)

Opened in: 1998

Minimum Age: 18 (for parties)

 

(inside Artheater pic 1)

 

After these short facts please tell us something about the club and its history. What’s the philosophy behind? The idea? Which styles can your visitors celebrate here?

In 1998 we found the location in order to run a very modern aggressive independent theatre production there. I was always influenced by electronic music and producing events and raves, producing scores for performances, before and even parallel to my acting career, so was our theatrical piece. As there wasn’t any creative director we decided to create an idea of combining high level, experimental or „underground“ electronic parties, Jazz, art and independant theatre at one place. One reason was that cultural support was starting to increase in that times and independent cutural places had to work financially on their own. But most of all it was our item to reach new young audience for modern theatre and on the way convincing cultural audience to explore modern electronic music and club culture. And it worked ! In the last years we were developing more the concert sector, cause modern indie and alternative music and even modern jazz is a lot inspired by the story of electronic sounds. So you can find Techno in several and often very different forms, from dark/experimental to melodic, deep or ravy, but always curated with high claims and a lot of motivation. Our speciality here was always to combine them on one event, which gives the guests a wider range of sound and atmospheres while raving, and it opens mind and bodies. On the other hand you can explore very modern bands, a lot of new talents, festivals with students of the jazz faculty, as well as internationally known acts between Neo-Folk, New Pop, Indie/Alternative, Industrial, Postpunk and Experimental.

 

(inside Artheater pic 2)

 

Could you give us a short overview about your technical equipment? Is there special?

So we’re well equiped for party and concert there are a lot of options due to the lights and video, which gives us the possibility to create very different light sceneries and set-ups. It can easily getting ravy or dark. Or we can run the concerts very intimate or even seeming „big stage“ with high contrasts. The Basement is a very classic „Techno-Concrete-Bunker“ … and it’s what we’re known for since ages … The audio set-ups on both floors are very different, we have a FunktionOne-System on the Mainfloor which allows different acoustic soundqualities due to our program, and it’s very clear and pumping for Techno. But that’s working just because of our great team of technicians, what’s in general our basic concept in any departments of the club : Teamwork!

In the basement we have a huge AD24 -System with a lot of Tops and Subs to create a more organic rough sounds which is very loved by a lot of pure Techno artists coming to our club, and of course also loved by the dancers.

 

(inside Artheater pic 3)

 

Do you run own parties? Do you have some resident DJs?

We run own parties an we have promoters doing there own party series in Artheater. That’s what makes us building such a diversitive program and developing the club further over so many years. But we

This is how we create also our specials, bringing together ideas, contrasts, love for music from different points of view to present highly motivated events. Thus like Sector, BergWacht, Tag X, Modern Musement and many more. And it’s also the base for our residents. They are actually creating the vibe of a party or a club. They are there when the first guests are coming in to welcome them, they are there when the last dancers are leaving to lead them out of the night. They are building bridges ore introducing the main artists soundwise, solving problems caused by the dramaturgy of others. And alsothey are always the connectors to and between the scenes and possees. Especially nowadays, where the fees are often killing the finances of smaller clubs, it’s obvious that you can book any wellknown techno artist if you can pay him, but without your team it’ll never become an euphoric event or rave … like we all wish to be.

Resident Djs see next step for details

 

(inside Artheater pic 4)

 

Short introduction of the residents

LIHO …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Kavaro …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Christian Zah …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Gutkind …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Jan Keuchen …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Julian Althaus …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Catweasel …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Matze …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Kasimirk …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Felix Stückmann …. Facebook | Soundcloud

Stikdorn …. Soundcloud

Christian Gerlach …. Facebook | Soundcloud

 

(selected resident mixes/sets)

 

Besides own parties: are the regular parties by other promoters? Please tell us some details.

see above

 

And are there specials? Special performances? Something different?

We just celebrate 20 years of Artheater … check the events here

 

(inside Artheater pic 5)

 

Please name a few artists who already played here.

DJs spinning in Artheater last year: Gaiser, Max Cooper, Johannes Heil, Matador, Slam, Henning Baer, Boston 168, Dax J, Regis, Broken English Club, Schwefelgelb, Cleric, Tommy Four Seven, Vatican Shadow, Tim Green, Inigo Kennedy, Sunil Sharpe, CJ Bolland, Thomas P.Heckmann, Shlomi Aber, Marcel Fengler, Florian Meindl, Cari Lekebusch, Einmusik, Jeroen Search, Kobosil, Sebastién Legér, Miss Melera, Anetha, Regal, Roberto Capuano, Egbert, Steve Bug and many more.

And during the story of Artheater: Ricardo Villalobos, Jeff Mills, Ancient Methods, Rrose, Carsten Nicolai/Alva Noto, Cio D’or, Paula Temple, Sleeparchive, Dasha Rush, Speedy J., Gabriel Ananda, Olivier Weiter, Fairmont, Microtrauma, Dominik Eulberg, Enrico Sangiuliano, Joseph Capriati, Christian Morgenstern, Daso, Octave One, Shxcxchcxsh, SHDW and Obscure Shape, UVB, Bassmoy, SNTS, Michael Mayer, Wolfgang Voigt, Jörg Burger/The Modernist and many many many more …

 

(inside Artheater pic 6)

 

Coming to an end of this short feature. What are your future plans? Any nice DJs playing here soon? Anything else you wanna say?

Let’s survive the month of „20 Jahre Artheater“ …and than we’ll start again thinking about the future … we were always changing and developing … and we’ll continue doing so … it’s all about MUSIC !