Posts Tagged ‘GDR’
Berlin’s GDR Museum
John Feffer explores the split personality of Berlin's GDR Museum... The GDR Museum in Berlin is actually two museums in one. And these two parts, both devoted to everyday life in the German Democratic Republic, subtly contradict one another. That might not have been the intention of the museum founders. But this tension actually captures the ambiguities of East Germany and the ambivalence that many Germans feel today about the erstwhile communist state. The experience inside the main [...]
The Hidden Watchtower
Marcel Krueger meets the man who turned a GDR watchtower into a memorial for his murdered brother... „Gegen Verräter und Grenzverletzer ist die Schußwaffe anzuwenden. Es sind solche Maßnahmen zu treffen, daß Verbrecher in der 100-m-Sperrzone gestellt werden können. Beobachtungs- und Schußfeld ist in der Sperrzone zu schaffen.“ "Firearms are to be used against traitors and those attempting to violate the border. Measures should be taken with the aim of halting the criminal inside [...]
GDR Museumswohnung
Grashina Gabelmann visits an East German home that's been preserved as a museum... Whether it’s through movies such as Goodbye Lenin, books like Anna Funder’s Stasiland, Berlin institutions like the Stasi Museum or Hohenschoenhausen, or one of the city’s many themed walking tours, you’ll probably know something about the GDR (German Democratic Republic). But unless you’re one of the rare people who actually lived in East Germany between 1949-1990, you probably won’t know [...]
The GDR Murals Of Magdalenenstrasse U Bahn
The Berlin U-Bahn station Magdalenenstraße, on the city’s U5 line, does not have any advertising hoardings along its walls. Instead, it features a remarkable series of hand-painted murals depicting scenes from German labour history, created by the German painter Wolfgang Frankenstein. The murals were commissioned and installed by the East German government in 1986, as part of their official celebrations of the 750th anniversary of the founding of the city of Berlin in 1237. There were [...]
Rocking Remembrance
Does Berlin need another memorial that simulates historical experience? No, argues Dr. Karl Schlögel, who suggests the city should take itself "a little more seriously"... In 2009 the Bundestag launched a public competition to design a memorial to Freedom and Unity, in memory of the peaceful revolution in the GDR and German reunification. The winning design by Stuttgart designer Johannes Milla and Berlin choreographer Sasha Waltz is due to be erected on Berlin's [...]
Majakowskiring
Richard Carter takes a trip to Pankow to explore the former houses of the SED politicians... "Entschuldigen Sie, ist das der Sonderzug nach Pankow?" (excuse me, is that the special train to Pankow) sang West German rocker Udo Lindenberg in his 1983 hit Sonderzug nach Pankow. In it, he suggested he'd sit down with East German leader Erich Honecker to ask, over a bottle of Cognac, to be allowed to perform in East Germany. He suggested that Honecker was really a closet rocker who'd don a [...]
Volkspark Friedrichshain
Everyone loves a good park. Volkspark Friedrichshain is one of Berlin’s finest… Even by Berlin’s high standards, the Volkspark Friedrichshain stands out as one of the city’s special green spaces. Established a century and a half ago to commemorate the centennial of Frederick the Great's accession to the throne, it gives good history, swathes of Liegewiese (sunbathing areas), an abundance of leisure opportunities and more than its fair share of interesting landmarks. Casually [...]
To Rococo Rot
Paul Sullivan chats to Berlin-based electronica mavericks Robert and Ronald Lippok, aka To Rococo Rot... “This was where the main bohemian scene used to be,” states Ronald Lippok, gesturing out of a large café window in the general direction of Kastanienallee. “When we were younger, playing in punk-rock bands, all the rehearsal spaces were around Schoenhauser Allee and here in Zionskirchplatz. This was the centre of the art scene in the 80s. Places like the Wiener café and the [...]
