Fraternal Kiss
The East Side Gallery is a collection of artworks painted on the remnants of the Berlin Wall as it runs along the River Spree. The one I am in front off front off is by the Russian painter Dmitri Vrubel, called “My God, Help Me to Survive This Deadly Love”. All up 105 art works were originally painted.
It is well worth reading about the Gallery and the conflicts surrounding it – http://bit.ly/1g2e9rt
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Part of the Jewish cemetery ( Jüdischer Friedhof ) in Schonhauser Allee, Prenzlauer. It’s history is an interesting read, although the only gravesite I specifically went looking for was that of Max Liebermann, the expressionist painter who died in 1935. His wife committed suicide in 1943 rather than be deported and is also buried in the family plot.
Apparently the broken gravestones are not a result of deliberate vandalism during the Nazi era, but were damage d in WWII – http://bit.ly/1sgZb2Z…
Peaceful scene on the Landwehr Canal, Berlin. For those of a historical bent, it was into this canal that Rosa Luxemburg‘s body was dumped after she was murdered by the Freikorps on 15 January 1919. “Freedom is always the freedom of the one who thinks differently” http://bit.ly/1pXT1an
In the Stolpersteine in the footpaths outside many buildings in Berlin are such simple but poignant stories. This collection of four is outside a building in Danzigerstrase, Prenzlauer. The information relates to a Jewish family that lived in the adjacent house. Arthur Wolfberg, born 1897 (by inference the father), Herta Wolfberg born 1899 (by inference the mother, Helga Wolfberg born 1924 (daughter?) and Gunter Wolfberg born 1925 (son?). All deported 3 February 1943, all murdered in Auschwitz. http://bit.ly/1miyZ8Z
My search for significant street art in Berlin took me to Cuvrystrasse in Kreuzberg. I was looking for a two part mural by the Italian artist Blu. One depicting an unmasking my two figures making East and West signs with their hands, the other a business man adjusting his tie with a gold chain between two rolex watches
Having seen a number of photos of the artwork I was surprised to see what I expected was an open area, to be surrounded by a set of fences, and the site full of shacks built from assortments of building materials, plastic tarps and the like.
Initially I was just going to take a couple of photos from outside and leave, however I started talking to one of the occupants who I understood came from Bulgaria. “Talk” may be an exaggeration as we had no language in common. I explained what I was doing and he offered to take me through the camp to the walls – I explained I would not take any photos of the camp or occupants.
Within the camp there were braziers cooking lunch and quite a few kids who ran to the walls with me. I took my photos, thanked the man who showed me the way with a tip, and left
Since then I’ve been reading a lot about Kreuzberg and Cuvrystrasse, trying to become more knowledgeable about its place in Berlin culture. Some of it is about freedom and the community response to gentrification. Some is about protest and violence, some about celebration.
The next closest U-bahn stop to where we are staying is Senefelderplatz. Named after the inventor of lithography, nearby is a marble statue of him. I thought naming it with the sort of mirror reversed lettering lithography uses, and having one of the putti looking at it with a mirror a nice touch. #sculpture
Alois Senefelder
One of the murals I was determined to see while in Berlin was this of the astronaut painted by Portugese born, Danish based artist – Victor Ash ( www.victorash.net/ ). I took several shots of the work which is about four-five stories tall. This was my favourite however as it shows the size of the work in relation to the building it is on, and the park in front of it.
Down a side street off the busy commercial hub of Potsdamer Platz is this relic of the Berlin Wall and the Cold War,an East German watchtower. The “panorama observation tower” originally stood between the Brandenburg Gate and Leipziger Platz and served as a base for border guards. Construction of these crenelated type BT 6 watchtowers began in 1966 and there were at one time 200 of them.
Originally a guardhouse in the 1800s, Neue Wache ( or New Guardhouse ) has been a war memorial since the 1930s.
It is really just a single room, containing a single sculpture, an enlarged version of Käthe Kollwitz’s Mother with her Dead Son. The sculpture is directly under the oculus ( a round, eye-like opening in the roof ), and so is exposed to the rain, snow and cold of the Berlin climate, symbolising the suffering of civilians during World War II.?
Art works, Teufelsberg
I left it for a couple of days to recover from the information overload which was my trip to Field Station, Berlin or Teufelsberg as it is more commonly known.
Today however I went through the photos I had taken of the art works on the mountain
Built on an artificial mountain created after WWII, the Cold War listening post ran from 1963 through to the early 1990s. Once the operators left however, the site was abandoned and fell into the sort of ruin you see today. Since about 2010, volunteers have gradually cleared out some of the rubble and attempted to preserve what is left.
Since 2012 a community of groups including artists and historians have worked to bring life back to the Devil’s Mountain, including tours and art events.
My Flickr photos – Teufelsberg street art
Links
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