Wolfgang Ramadan
Poetry, cut-out animation, and a very Bavarian sense of humor.
Not every project needs a big brief, a commercial client, or a festival deadline. Sometimes work starts with two creative people finding each other and just deciding to make something. That’s exactly what happened with LyrikTrick — a YouTube collaboration between Arne and Bavarian poet, performer and all-round creative force Wolfgang Ramadan.
Who is Wolfgang Ramadan?
Wolfgang is a Munich-based poet, cabaret artist and storyteller with a body of work that stretches from Bavarian lyric poetry to documentary film, street theatre and music cabaret. His book Real Bairisch — a collection of aphorisms, short poems and bittersweet everyday wisdom rooted firmly in the Bavarian tradition — became the foundation for the entire LyrikTrick project. He’s the kind of person who takes language seriously and playfully at the same time. Which, as it turns out, makes him a perfect match for animation.
When Animation Met Activism
The LyrikTrick collaboration took on a different dimension when Wolfgang asked Arne to create an animated clip in support of the ÖDP’s Volksbegehren Artenvielfalt — Rettet die Bienen! campaign. The petition, initiated by the Ökologisch-Demokratische Partei Bavaria, called for urgent legislative action to stop the dramatic decline of insect and bird species across the state.
What followed was nothing short of historic. The Volksbegehren became the most successful in the entire history of Bavaria — with 1.8 million people, 18.4% of all eligible voters, signing in support. The Bavarian Landtag accepted the petition’s legislation directly, meaning it never even had to go to a public vote — and significant changes to Bavaria’s nature protection law came into force as early as August 2019.
Of course, a petition of that scale succeeded through the efforts of thousands of people, organisations and activists. But a charming, accessible animated clip — one that could cut through the noise and explain a complex ecological issue with warmth and wit — is exactly the kind of thing that helps a campaign reach people who might otherwise scroll past. We’d like to think it played its small part.
A good reminder
LyrikTrick is a reminder that animation doesn’t always have to be a large-scale production. Sometimes the most satisfying creative work is the kind you do in your own time, with a collaborator you trust, on a subject that genuinely interests you. And sometimes that work ends up contributing to a law. Not a bad outcome for a project that started with a poem and a pair of scissors.
Credits
- Concept & Poems: Wolfgang Ramadan
- Animation: Arne Hain
- A collaboration between: Wolfgang Ramadan & Arne Hain