Earlier this year I spend a month in Berlin.
Not only is it OK to wander the streets with a beer, but the railway stations normally have a bottle shop just to get you through the walk from the station to home.
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
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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Main trip today was to Brücke Museum which “houses the world’s largest collection of works by Die Brücke (“The Bridge”), an early 20th-century expressionist movement. Apart from the artwork the building itself is a neat design with natural light wells illuminating the artwork on the walls.
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While I was at Urban Spree in Friedrichshain, one young artist was working on a piece near the front door to the gallery space.
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Spent a large part of yesterday riding the Great Circle line anti-clockwise .. that is , on the 598
