An artist with money is a rare breed in unemployment-ridden, staunchly proletarian Berlin. But Claus Amler says having cash in the bank became a cause for concern once the government guaranteed all deposits and savings accounts, rather than the comfort it used to be. “I told myself: If they’re doing this, then the situation must really be desperate,” he says.

Now he is looking for a new home for his savings. “I have long thought about buying property in Berlin,” he says as he pauses on the doorstep of the Berlin Savings Bank near the Friedrichstrasse train station. “Now I’m doing it. I will put everything I have, including money parked in Austria, into this.”