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A day with Elvir Omerbegovic

He runs ‘Selfmade Records’, the most successful German hip hop label of the last ten years where rappers like Genetikk, Casper or the 257ers are or were under contract.  With his new label ‘Division’, he is responsible for RIN who represents a new generation of German hip hop artists. He is also the ‘President of Rap’ at Universal Music Germany, his fashion label ‘Pusher Apparel’ is selling like hotcakes and he has a private collection of sneakers and sweatpants. What drives somebody like Elvir Omerbegovic? THE DORF met the 37 year old at his office in Düsseldorf.

Kaspar van de Water

Kaspar van de Water is the brain behind Callshop Radio, a radio station, that is on air since April 2017. Together with Fernando Diaz, he founded the radio station following the example of independent online stations like NTS Radio and Red Light Radio from London and Amsterdam respectively.

PALOMA VARGA WEISZ

A naked man hangs from the ceiling. His long-limbed, life-sized body is the rst thing coming into view, as the heavy studio door opens. The room with high ceilings and the cathedral-like windows is located in a former factory building of the “Duewag” on the edge of the Lierenfeld industrial estate. There is a strong smell of wood in the air. The male nude’s eyes are closed. He is slim, slender and made of limewood. This is the wood from which most of the sculptures of the Düsseldorfer artist Paloma Varga Weisz are made.

ALICE EIKELPOTH

‘please excuse my many spelling mistakes in the interview, the keyboard of my laptop is broken and i can’t use capital letters nor question or exclamation marks, haha…sorry’, writes Alice Eikelpoth when sending her questionnaire back.

FROM COAL TO CULTURE: RUHRGEBIET RELOADED

Get into the car at the weekend, leave Düsseldorf ’s city limits behind and drive to the neighbouring region of the RUHR AREA to enjoy a bit of cultural diversity. ‘Ab in den Pott’ as the locals would say. It is a region that made history due to its heavy industrial manufacturing past. Even though the collieries were closed long ago, the Ruhrgebiet remains acutely alive due to its extremely high population density.

GRETA’S SISTER

In December of 2016, the writer Christine Weissenborn together with her sister-in-law, the illustrator Sarah Neuendorf, published the delightful children’s book ‚Greta’s sister‘. Exclusively for THE DORF THE MAG the two of them have placed Greta, the whale and Anuk, the island girl in Düsseldorf and tell the story of why Greta is swimming in the Rhine. And what carnival has to do with the South Sea.

Gil Bronner

“My own unpunctuality is my rebellion against my father’s punctuality”, says Gil Bronner when he walks through the door of his Philara Collection only slightly late. The former glass factory Lennartz that the property developer bought and rebuilt extensively over the course of two years lies in a shabby backyard off Birkenstraße.

WOLF OF WALL STREET

For our photographer Sabrina Weniger, tiny Wallstraße
in the heart of the old town perfectly reflects the native and true Düsseldorf: a bit rough and eccentric, a bit chic and elegant, a bit old and dirty and most of all: with its heart in the right place. Even though it’s located directly in the city centre, it is easily overlooked.