Tag Archives: Freedom

POSTCARDS FROM EAST-BERLIN / GDR

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The above colorant picture shows a detail of the wall freeze at House of the Teacher near Alexanderplatz, Berlin-Mitte. It was realized by GDR artist Walter Womacka in 1965 and reflects the modern spirit of those days quite well in the style of Socialist Realism. However, similar imagery like here above did exist in the West as well in the 1960s –  mostly on rather large houses.

Parade in East-Berlin / 30th anniversary of the founding of the GDR
photo made on 7 October 1979 by Wolfgang Kluge, CC-BY-SA 3.0

In the early 1980s I already lived in West-Berlin and joined the international mail-art network where I was active till 1991. Here artists from around the world practized mutual exchange and collaborations via the good old postal services, a kind of slow blogging existing till today.

Especially for people living in the former communist countries of East-Europe mail-art was a nice option for keeping in touch with the rest of the world. So here I will show you some postcards and/or other correspondence received by me from East-Berlin and other parts of former GDR in the 1980s.

I know nothing but art / Robert Rehfeldt, East-Berlin

A printed message / Joseph W. Huber, East-Berlin

I was also sometimes, not very often, in East-Berlin, so I did meet Robert Rehfeldt and Joseph W. Huber also in real life and personally, both are already deceased. 

Jungle of Art / Collaborative, postal and collective collage

I am writing and posting all this as part of a global process which means fundamental creativity in itself.

Authorities misdirect / Roland Beier, Neubrandenburg

Abstraction / Jörg Sonntag, Dresden

Exit-Sticker / Wolfgang Schneider & Thomas Westermann, Magdeburg

Looking at the diverse messages nearly 40 years later is quite strange, I can mostly not find anything GDR typical, may be in the next one.

Decadent mail (both sides) / Birger Jesch, Dresden

Creativity and/or art and/or anti-art (whatever you prefer and like) can not be controlled completely or transmuted to sheer propaganda it will  always survive and blossom  at least in our minds from where new bridges can be built even thru very thick walls and right out of gruesome dungeons. 



Serigraphy / Uwe Dressler, Cottbus

TWILIGHT OF THE POPULIST IDOLS

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A malignant spectre is again creeping across the streets of Europe, it is the ghost of simplistic truths and self-appointed saviours of the West as a whole. The nationalist ideologies of the 19th and 20th centuries are on their way to a sickening revival in many countries.

Hitler, Stalin and Co. at Nordart Exhibition 2018
The responsible politicians – harmlessly called populists – have started a postmodern witch hunt, the victims of this undeclared war are now refugees, foreigners or people of other faiths and lifestyles. The globalisation of this retrograde zeitgeist has opened up new battlefields where peace should actually reign.

Winning the Arms Race in Red Square, Carl Chaplin, 1986
These ruthless ideologues want to turn back the clock, which risks reheating old, already forgotten conflicts. Like unscrupulous sorcerers’ pupils, the radical nationalists have lit blazing fires and pyres all over Europe and elsewhere that urgently need to be put out again. Poland has just shown and proven by the national election of October, 15, 2023, that this is possible and feasible – a great significant step and symbolic signal!
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Phillip Boa & The Voodoo Club, And Then She Kissed Her – 2010
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