Berlin is famed for its lavish cultural riches. But “after decades of floating along on generous public handouts, Berlin’s famed cultural world has been feeling the chill wind of the fiscal austerity that has now descended on Germany, with the German capital saddled with debts totalling more than EUR 40 billion and a massive hole emerging in the city’s annual arts budget. ‘Den Guertel enger schnallen’ (belt tightening) has suddenly become the new chorus rising from the German capital’s army of arts bureaucrats, forcing them to seek funds in very unknown territory the private sector.”