Berlin

Day Two

Began the day at the Potsdamer Platz Starbucks. That should give you an idea how much things have changed in Germany. Not to mention the fact that Potsdamer Platz was a desolate zone of abandonement with the Wall running through it until 1989. And then reconstruction only began in the mid-90s.

The Platz was filled with soccer-related activities--the World Cup, hosted by Germany, is just a couple of weeks off--and on the horizon, the Fernsehturm's ball-shaped top was decorated as a magenta and silver soccer ball. Magenta being the ever present color of sponsor Deutsche Telecom. I took a photograph of the Berlin Wall exhibit, comprised of wall segments and information panels, in front of one of the entrances to the Potsdamer Platz Bahnhof.


Holocaust Memorial

I then walked a short distance away to the Holocaust memorial, to be exact, the Monument to the Murdered Jews of Europe. I understand the reasons for the name, but the chilling specificity of it guarantees that it will never be used by most visitors. I've already had a heated conversation with someone who did not apprehend nor appreciate the fact that the memorial excluded the Gypsies, homosexuals, and other victims of the Nazis. Whatever the matter, the memorial has become an enormously "popular" tourist destination.

I last photographed the site in 2004 when finishing up my book The Lost Border. At that time, it was mostly finished, but still fenced off. Visitors could climb viewing platforms for a better view. Now, the field of stone beckons one and all to wade in among the black slabs and descend into the disorienting grid. Children delight in the maze-like aspect of it, which is something architect Peter Eisenman anticipated. But he would likely not approve of the fast food outlets and souvenir shops that have been given residence along the eastern edge of the memorial.

I stayed at the memorial for about three hours taking pictures. Several people came up to chat. One elderly woman from the Netherlands who remembered Kristallnacht and all that followed soon after. The sun was intermittent, which meant I had to wait for long periods of time for the light, but the skies were filled with swiftly moving clouds. I spoke with one student photographer from Germany, and told him that I was not really photographing the thing itself, but rather what contains the thing itself. By that I meant the landscape versus particular objects or events, as well as my philosophical approach to looking at the world.


Berlin Wall Memorial, Marie-Elisabeth Lueders House,
Reichstag in the background

After that I walked past the Brandenburg Gate and Reichstag taking a couple of pictures along the way. I was interested in the new Hauptbahnhof, which was about to open that weekend, but with cloudiness and light rain I moved on. I crossed the Spree river and entered a Berlin Wall memorial in one of the government buildings. A number of slabs of the Wall had been erected in a large space following the trace of the former borderline. The slabs were painted with the numbers of people killed trying to escape across the border each year beginning with 1961 when the Wall was erected. The presentation was credited to the building's architect, but I knew that the idea was taken from an earlier unofficial memorial done outside by Ben Wargin. Here is the original installation.

Berlin

Day One

I flew into Tegel airport, a hopelessly outmoded airport left over from the Cold War days, rented my car, and met up with my friend Anamarie at her house in Zehlendorf. It rained heavily all afternoon, so we went to the Martin-Gropius-Bau (museum) to see the Robert Polidori show. I have long admired Polidori's architectural photography and have two of his books. There is a strong formal rigor to his compositions, which anchors the lush colors of old Havana or the acidy greens and purples of abandoned Chernobyl. This was the first time I'd seen his large prints--size being the rage these days--but appropriate, perhaps, for his work. The prints appeared to be conventional c-prints mounted on plexi or some other backing and then floated inside a frame. It is clear that the prints were made from digital scans, the tonal range often a bit unbelievable--shadows too open, highlights too closed, colors too saturated, separate surfaces too well delineated. Sometimes it gave his images a Vermeer-like photo-realism, which was enhanced in the Versailles pictures by the side light and glimpses of other rooms through doorways. But was this quality intentional? Would the prints have worked just as well with a lighter hand in Photoshop?


Polidori at the Martin-Gropius-Bau, large digital prints

The Martin-Gropius-Bau spaces were haphazardly lit, and I fought reflections constantly, but the older architecture of the galleries suited the images fine. I could have used fewer prints, however, and wish the exhibit had stayed exclusively with the Havana, Chernobyl, and Versailles images. Two extremely large images, digitally rendered more coarsely than the others, were completely unnecessary and should have been left out. I enjoyed the exhibit, despite the above complaints, but I prefer Polidori's books and seeing his color spreads leap out of the black and white print of the New Yorker magazine.

Amsterdam/Berlin

I've been working pretty much every day on the scans I did in New York a few weeks ago. There are about 45 images all together, 15 each from New York, Amsterdam, and Berlin. The plan is to print these at 20x24 inches for portfolio purposes with a few, perhaps, at 40x50 inches. I will be working with Ben Diep in New York at Color Space Imaging to make the prints.

The Berlin series includes a few of the Lost Border pictures, but none from before 1989 when the Wall came down. A number of them were made in what was East Berlin and show vestiges of the former Communist regime. One picture was shot through the Iron fence in front of the Soviet embassy on Unter den Linden, a bust of Lenin staring outward. Another includes a large statue of Lenin standing on a traffic island in front of a large housing project. And I made several photographs of the Soviet war memorial in Treptow, a monumental assemblage of statues and stone sarcophagi with bas reliefs depicting the heroism of the Soviet Army. There are quotes by Stalin etched in stone, chilling to encounter in person. The memorial at Treptow still exists and is being actively maintained, but much of Communist East Germany has already disappeared. The Palast der Republik is presently being torn down (see pictures here on Flkr), and I have a photograph from the late '90s that will be part of my Berlin series.



Communist era mural (4x5 film)

Another existing piece of pre-1989 history, a mural illustrating the supposed worker's paradise of the German Democratic Republic, has been preserved in Berlin Mitte. My photograph was made shortly after the Wall came down. I also took some photographs of East Berlin before '89, see below, but I found the experience unnerving, and felt that it was just a matter of time before I was detained by the East German authorities. So, I ended that mini-project after several days of work.



East Berlin, 1987, before the Wall came down (4x5 film)

Thursday I am flying to Berlin and plan to put in three or four days shooting. I no longer feel the need to stick to the former path of the Wall, though I will certainly retrace the line through the center of the city. I will see what's left of the Palast of the Republik, and I am hoping to get a good photograph of the Holocaust memorial near Potsdamer Platz. I will also take a look at the new central train station recently completed near the Reichstag. Since I am traveling without a laptop, I won't be able to post anything until after I return next week.

Amsterdam/Groningen

Ricoh GR Digital

For the past few months I have been using the camera above, a wonderful pocket-sized digital camera. Despite my ongoing allegiance to the 4x5 view camera, I have been smitten with this baby camera with wide angle lens, and optical viewfinder (not shown in photo). I've been using it for this journal and taking it with me when going out with the view camera. It is a near perfect camera, but it has a few flaws, and one bit me the other day. The lens is retractable, which makes the camera completely flat when not in use. But when the lens is extended, it is not as solid as a lens with a fixed mount. While fiddling with it, the camera slipped off my desk and landed extended lens first. The lens mechanism jammed and would not budge. So, my current infatuation is off to the repair shop leaving me bereft and cameraless. I'll be posting view camera pictures that I am working on in the meantime.

Tomorrow, I am headed to a small town near Groningen in the north of Holland for a family weekend outing. Next Thursday I will be traveling to Berlin with my view camera--and the Ricoh digital if it comes back from the shop in time.

Amsterdam/Borders

The Iron Curtain, 1987 (4x5 film)

As many of you already know, I recently published The Lost Border, the Landscape of the Iron Curtain, and most of the pictures from the book are also available on the Lost Border website. It is a project I began in 1985 when walls and fences traversed Europe dividing East and West. Subsequently, the Berlin Wall opened in 1989, Communism fell, and Germany reunified. The healing is incomplete, but it is ongoing, and in response to that I have continued to photograph the rebuilding of Berlin up to the present.

Today, the U.S. Senate voted to extend the barrier along the Mexican border an additional 500 miles. I do not pretend to have a solution to the illegal immigration problem, but I do know first hand the ugliness of walls, and that ultimately they fail to deter those who seek freedom. I also believe that such barriers become the recognizable face of countries--East Germany then, Israel and the U.S. today. These images are inevitably hard, if not brutal. It does not matter whether the walls are intended to keep people in or out. They are a futile response to conflicts that remain tragically unresolved. The construction of more walls and fences along the Mexican border is a sign of defeat.

Amsterdam/Ayaan Hirsi Ali

PARIS, May 15 — The Dutch government on Monday abruptly threatened to revoke the citizenship of one of the country's most prominent members of Parliament, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born woman who arrived as a refugee 14 years ago.
--New York Times

I have never cared for Hirsi Ali's politics, which I've found polarizing and self-aggrandizing. However, this is a political assasination virtually as despicable as the actual assasinations of Theo van Gogh and Pim Fortuyn. I am stunned.



Amsterdam, Mercatorplein (4x5 film)

Amsterdam/Texel

The weather remains unusually warm and pleasant here in the Netherlands. I am mostly working on the scans I did in New York, which will be printed for my New York/Amsterdam/Berlin portfolio. On Sunday we picked up Brendan, my son, from the island of Texel, on the North Sea coast. He was there visiting with his grandparents who have a house on the island.

Texel is the largest of the barrier islands along the northwest coast of Holland. Were it not for the dikes, it would consist primarily of a ridge of dunes. But there is a substantial hinterland behind the dunes with much farming, a few towns, and scattered vacation houses and camp grounds. The landscape is beautiful both in the dunes and on the flatland, and there are picturesque older farmhouses. But generally, the architecture is bland with lots of cheap brick and concrete. Despite the relative remoteness of the island--you can only get there by ferry--it is primarily a destination of middle class Dutch and German tourists, and to me, it lacks character. I'm sure the Dutch would argue with that.


Texel, on the coast of the Netherlands

Amsterdam

Amsterdam, hazy morning

Back in Amsterdam, the weather was cold and wet for several days. But that has dramatically changed, and my studio is bathed in bright sunlight. The temperature is up near 70 degrees. Even though I place black foam board around my computer, it is difficult with so much light to work on images until later in the day--the evening is better.

Yesterday, I came home with my son Brendan, and a large group of Austrian architecture students were gawking at our famous building designed by the Dutch architecture firm MVRDV. Their teacher begged to let them see the interior, so I escorted them up to our apartment, and took them out to the large public balcony on the north end of the building. Although these were students on a field trip, it is common to see smaller groups of visitors engaged in the increasingly popular activity of architectural tourism.