The laced floor of the Haus der Berliner Festspiele, view of ceiling

Structure

KBB’s content is represented by its venues – Berliner Festspiele including the Gropius Bau, International Film Festival, in short Berlinale, and Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW). At the same time, they form the three business divisions of KBB. As institutions with international appeal and each with its own identity, the venues are independent in their programming. Each division has several departments such as its own artistic directorate, communications and press department as well as multi-faceted programming and production departments.

Departments responsible for all three divisions ensure the necessary efficiency and stability for a cultural institution of this size. These include finance and accounting, procurement management, controlling, human resources, technical services, information technology, ticket office and guest accommodation. They are centrally steered by the managing director and provide the administrative and organisational structure for the Berliner Festspiele including the Gropius Bau, Berlinale and Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW). By supervising processes, they support the artistic divisions, form the basis for a high degree of flexibility and, together with the managing director, ensure legal compliance.

KBB is a federal company. It is funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media and is financed by federal funds for culture, its own income, sponsoring and by acquiring third-party funds.

Members of the Supervisory Board

The supervisory board of KBB supports and supervises management in a trusting partnership. Its twelve members consist of four representatives each from the federal government and the state of Berlin as well as four additional independent representatives. The supervisory board meets twice a year and is chaired by the Minister of State for Culture and Media.

To the Members of the supervisory board

Management

Three artistic directors and one managing director together take on the task of representing KBB to the outside world and developing it further as an interdisciplinary cultural facilitator institution. The respective artistic directors are responsible for artistic decisions and thus for the content of the divisions. Their decisions are implemented by the programme departments, while the central departments support the implementation of the processes and ensure legal compliance.

The artistic directors and the managing director jointly represent the respective divisions. Regular consultation between the directors leads to an overarching dialogue that takes political stimuli into account without neglecting the artistic freedom of the divisions.

These are the members of management:

Mariëtte Rissenbeek

 

Director

 

Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin

 

Mariëtte Rissenbeek was born in the Netherlands in 1956 and studied German language and literature, theatre studies, and sociology at the Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht and the Freie Universität Berlin. After completing her Master’s degree, she settled permanently in Berlin and initially worked at the Löhlein & Schonert advertising agency. From 1986 she worked for the distribution and sales company Tobis Film and was responsible for both the acquisition and exploitation of German-language ancillary rights. In 1995 she moved to film production, working as a producer at Ziegler Film, where she realised several television films as well as some short and medium-length feature films. In 1998 she founded her own production company in Hamburg and collaborated with Mika Kaurismäki before joining the Munich production company Hofmann & Voges in 2000.

In 2003 Mariëtte Rissenbeek took over responsibility for international festival relations and public relations at German Films, the German institution for the international promotion of German cinema. In 2006 she was appointed deputy managing director of German Films and in 2011 managing director.

Prof. Dr. Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung

 

Director

 

Haus der Kulturen der Welt (HKW)

 

Prof. Dr. Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung, born 1977 in Yaoundé, Cameroon, is a curator, author, and biotechnologist. He is the founder and was artistic director of SAVVY Contemporary Berlin. He was artistic director of sonsbeek 20→24, a quadrennial contemporary art exhibition in Arnhem, the Netherlands, and artistic director of the 14<sup>th</sup> Rencontres de Bamako in 2022, a biennial of African photography in Mali. He was curator-at-large of documenta 14 in Athens and Kassel, artistic director of the 12<sup>th</sup> Rencontres de Bamako in 2019, and guest curator of the Dak’Art Biennale 2018 in Dakar, Senegal. Together with the Miracle Workers Collective, he curated the Finnish Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale. Ndikung was visiting professor of Curatorial Studies and Sound Art at the Städelschule in Frankfurt and was the recipient of the first OCAD University International Curators Residency Fellowship in Toronto in 2020. He is professor of the Master’s course in Spatial Strategies at the Kunsthochschule Weissensee, Berlin.

In October 2020, Ndikung was awarded the Order of Merit of the State of Berlin in recognition of SAVVY Contemporary’s work over the previous ten years. In June 2021, a jury led by former Minister of State for Culture and Media Monika Grütters appointed Bonaventure Ndikung as the new artistic director of HKW from 1 January 2023.

Matthias Pees

 

Director

 

Matthias Pees, born 1970 in Georgsmarienhütte, has worked as artistic and managing director of the international production house Künstlerhaus Mousonturm in Frankfurt am Main (2013-2022), head dramaturge of the Wiener Festwochen (2010-2013), founder and co-managing director of the international production office PROD.ART.BR in São Paulo (2004-2010), programme dramaturge at the Ruhrfestspiele Recklinghausen (2003-2004), theatre dramaturge at Schauspiel Hannover (2000-2003), and at the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz (1995-2000). He previously gained experience as a cultural journalist and theatre critic in various fields and on several sides of the performing arts. Changes of perspective, cooperative work, and “transformative practices” were avowedly at the centre of his interest; themes such as global solidarity and postcolonialism, the context and future of internationality and diversity shaped his playbills and projects. In Frankfurt and the Rhine-Main region, he initiated or collaborated in large interdisciplinary festivals and cooperation projects with, among others, the Ensemble Modern, the Jewish Museum Frankfurt, the Hessian State Ballet and, most recently, with Schauspiel Frankfurt, the Museum Angewandte Kunst, and the Frankfurt independent scene for the organisation of the festivals Politik im freien Theater by the Federal Agency for Civic Education/bpb and Theater der Welt by the International Theatre Institute (ITI).

Charlotte Sieben

 

Managing director

 

Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin (KBB) GmbH

 

Charlotte Sieben studied law at the University of Frankfurt am Main and subsequently completed a Master of Laws at the London School of Economics and Political Science. After working at the Hamburg State Opera and the Dessau Ballet, she was head of administration at the merged Altenburg-Gera Theatre for five years. Since 2005 she has worked at the Kulturveranstaltungen des Bundes in Berlin GmbH. In 2010, she was appointed by the supervisory board as KBB’s commercial director for the first time and has since managed KBB’s institutions together with the three artistic directors. She is responsible for the administrative departments of all KBB business divisions, the technical departments as well as the ticket office, award management, and guest accommodation departments. Charlotte Sieben has been a member of the presidium of the Deutscher Bühnenverein and co-chair of the extraordinary members’ group in the Bühnenverein since 2016. She represents the interests of the members of the Bühnenverein in the Assembly of Delegates of the Themis Confidential Body against Sexual Harassment and Violence. She is involved in the Women in Culture and Media mentoring programme of the Deutscher Kulturrat. In 2010 she initiated the EMAS certification of KBB, has been responsible for it since then, and regularly gives lectures on KBB’s commitment. 

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