regular bar, lived under our roof for a while, too, since he had no place of his own. For a long while, in fact, until our mother finally threw him out.
Sigga came to stay with us from Iceland, Chantal from Belgium, and Genevieve from French Switzerland. Carolyn came from Wales for what should have been a couple of weeks, but she stayed a whole year. She was short and fat and uncomplicated, and the family chaos didn’t bother her at all. We all loved Carolyn and later went to visit her in Ffestiniog; Martin stayed with her a few times.
“Easter with the Kippenbergers” (Reiner Zimnik, 1961)
© Reiner Zimnik
Pelle, the student from Norway who wanted to work for a couple of weeks in Essen, was our mother’s favorite. Dear, cheerful Pelle, who was training for the Olympics.
They all came and went. Only Heia and Köckel were always there: our neighbors. Without them we would have sunk into chaos, and our lives would not have functioned. Köckel fired up the old coal heater in the basement every morning and helped out whenever anything needed fixing. Energetic Heia kept things running smoothly, looked after the little ones, and kept her cool, even when her hand got caught in the blender. She roasted the meatballs and fried the potato pancakes that our mother didn’t know how to cook for us, and that we used for eating contests (Bine won: she ate twelve). The kitchen was our favorite place, because, among other reasons, it was the only warm room in the whole huge house. We ate there, talked there, drew, fought, baked cookies, and did our homework, and Martin monkeyed around and imitated people.
Our father called us “the Piranha family”: wherever there was something to eat, we threw ourselves at it, afraid that otherwise we would find nothing left. There were never enough treats; actually, there were sweets only when visitors brought them. But with seven family members, houseguests, and grandparents, it was almost always someone’s birthday: the only day in the year when the child was in charge of who was invited, what game to play, and what food to eat. Other holidays we celebrated included Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, Children’s Day (which our parents had introduced specially for us), the Mother-Isn’t-Home Party, Confirmation Day (in “special house style”), May Day, and Summer.
“St. Martin’s Day Procession at the Kippenbergers’” (Reiner Zimnik, 1961)
© Reiner Zimnik
Our parents were in their element as hosts: relaxed, happy, and generous. And they enjoyed themselves at least as much as their guests. “They didn’t go around serving their guests,” one cousin said. “They were ahead of their time that way.” They just put a big pot of soup on the stove for people to serve themselves, and a hundred eggs next to the stove for them to cook on their own. After a meal our mother sometimes even pressed aprons into the hands of the astonished men so that they would help with the dishes.
On December 6, St. Nicholas came to our house in person in his fur hat and loden coat and with his golden book. For advent it was the trombone choir, and at Christmas we hosted our whole extended family, who came back again for Easter. Several hundred eggs would be painted, Father would haul them into the garden by the bucketful, and many of them would be found only weeks later, or never.
Every year there were two Carnivals, one for the children and one for the grownups. Our parents would dress as Caesar and Cleopatra, or Zeus and Helen of Troy; our mother especially liked dressing up in slutty costumes: “cheap and trashy with all my heart.” “They kissed each other, loved each other, stayed in love, tragedies ensued,” our father wrote. “It took three years before some people surmounted the moral crisis of our first Carnival celebration in Aachen.” There was often a theme for the party, usually from a play or movie: “Greek Seeking Greekess,” “Suzie Wong,” “Guys and Dolls.”
Even for the summer party, people dressed in costume and danced until dawn. The massive buffet was set up on a market stall—pickled eggs, cucumbers, peasant bread—and we children got to drink whatever was left in all the opened cola bottles the next morning. Every party was planned, with things to watch and things to do, from a polonaise to a pantomime show to a ride in a donkey cart. “We will expect you at 4 p.m. and assume you will stay late,” read the invitation to the advent party of 1962, where more than a hundred guests spread out through the whole house and into the side houses, too, to “make, glue, decorate, bake, paint, dress, arrange, and photograph” under the direction of the master and mistress of the house, artists, and other friends. The church trombone choir appeared on the stairs. Guests were asked not to come empty-handed: “We also plan to collect clothes, toys, groceries, etc. for the elderly and needy in our community and for packages to send to the East.”
Our mother said once, “No one should ever say they don’t have time for Christmas preparations. I would say that they don’t have the heart, or the imagination.” For weeks leading up to the holiday, presents were wrapped, cookies baked, gifts put together; on the day after Christmas our mother would lie in bed, sick with exhaustion. “You love to overdo it,” our father told her. “Conserving your energy is not your strong suit.”
By New Year’s, everybody was worn out—except our father and Martin. Our father tried his best to keep us up, he wrote, but “Mother always gets tired and then there’s nothing to be done. Father is offended that no one appreciates his fireworks. Everyone’s yawning or snoring.” Only Martin went along with him to the neighbors next door, “since he likes dancing so much, and he’s right, it’s fun.”
Even when they were away from home our parents threw parties, for example in Munich at the house of our uncle Hanns, the youngest of our father’s three brothers. “Five Minutes Each” was the name of this party: only artist friends were invited, and “everyone is allowed to put on their own show, if they want, and if they don’t want to, they don’t have to.” One couple played guitars, a poet read, a sculptor brought out his sculptures, an illustrator told stories. The rest danced or contented themselves with being the audience.
The parties were always raucous, even when only the family members were there. In fact, those were often the loudest. No one went around on eggshells at the Kippenbergers’. “Uncle Otto made fun of Uncle Albrecht and father defended him. Then Leo was teased and Albrecht started defending him. In any case, it was all very lively.” Too lively for some people. At one legendary Christmas party, when the whole extended family had come over for turkey (three turkeys, to be precise), one uncle’s posh fiancée left the house in tears after a dirty joke and never returned to her intended again. Every party was a test of fortitude.
On weekends, we usually took day trips. We were dragged everywhere, to exhibitions, to Castle Benrath, to the Weseler Forest, and to the Münster area, with its moated castles and the poet Annette von Droste-Hülshoff’s Rüschhaus, which we visited again and again. Martin sought her out again later; for his 1997 sculpture exhibition, he set up a subway entrance next to the poet’s sculpture.
Every year on St. Martin’s Day, November 11, we traveled to Cappenberg to visit the Jansens, who also had five children. They had a big house with a fireplace and a dollhouse, and there was a lamplit procession with a real St. Martin on a real horse, which our Martin was allowed to ride, too. He was so proud of his namesake and this privilege that he was happy to share his bag of candy later. On All Saints Day we were allowed to go to the carnival in Soest with the Jansens: first came pea soup with the Sachses, then everyone got a roll of coins and could go crazy with it, and when we got lost we would be whistled back with the special family code-melody.
Trip
