Es gibt Kuchen _ Hermann zu Gast 

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Hermann

2017

Participatory chain letter in the guise of a lucky dough

Within the context of my diploma project, I decided to research about the social infrastructure of the Saar-region, where I studied. Saarland is one of the smallest counties in Germany and there is a rumour (like in other small regions), that everyone knows each other. So, if there is a problem to solve, one talks to their neighbour and either the person can help themselves, or they know someone who knows someone... Wanting to find out if this is true, I decided to start a chain letter with the help of a dough. The dough needs to be taken care of for 10 days. One needs to feed (milk, flour, sugar) and stir it before it can be split into 5 parts. One part remains with the person who took care of it (to become a cake), the four other parts are given to friends and family. Its exponential growth would have been enough to cover the whole area with dough within 100 days. My project was running for 140 days which would have been enough to cover the whole of Germany with this lucky dough called Hermann. Next to the dough, I also handed out instructions on how to take care of Hermann and an introduction to the project. I asked people to send me their addresses to be able to detect where the dough had travelled. Throughout the project duration, I shared the recipes which I created every 10 days and gave an overview of where Hermann had travelled. On the occasion of the diploma exhibition, visitors and participants were invited to eat 14 cakes which I had kept frozen for this purpose.