Pictures of A.

In the streets of Berlin, a man is riding a bicycle. A woman is perched on the handlebars. An officer of the Volkspolizei spots them: "Get off that bike - right now!" It is the beginning of a love affair that will not end happily.
A is a theatre director. The young woman is torn between working in the theatre, becoming a painter or opting for the life of a writer. A on his bike - this will be her first portrait of him. Barbara Honigmann's work has won numerous awards for the way "it portrays, in crystal clear language imbued with dazzling acuity and coruscating irony, the displaced lives of Jews in Europe and divided Germany" (Max-Frisch-Prize, 2011).

Pictures of A presents another facet of this portrayal: bringing to life the Bohemian counter-culture in vivid close-up while describing with unflinching candour an artist's struggle to find her unique path amidst the traumas she faces as she gradually becomes aware of her Jewish identity. Eventually the tensions become too great to bear, and the couple's lives take separate directions.