tuesday 17th january 2012

Today we decided to head to the Jewish memorial first thing in the morning. With such a prominent country history it only seemed right to look into that as well as current Berlin. The memorial museum is underground within the monuments The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe was designed by American architect Peter Eisenman, was dedicated on May 10 2005 in central Berlin.

The memorial is located 100 meters away from Berlin´s main architectonical symbol, the Brandenburger Gate, on a 19.073 m large field. It is composed of 2.711 oblongs in a variety of sizes and heights. It is a distilling place that is calm and quiet and a place of respect. Walking down into the oblongs the floor changes height and you become surrounded by the solid grey structures.

Life is really put into perspective when visiting the Holocaust museum entitled ’Memorial for the murdered Jews of Europe’, described the discrimination, murder and horrific conditions the Jews were subjected to during the world war period. With photographs, memories, diary entries and newspaper articles that show the true nature of the victimisation. Leaving the museum visitors are reminded ‘It happened once so it can happen again’, A real thought provoking, truthful and stirring quote.

From a student that visited Berlin the previous year we were recommended a tour called the ‘Alternative subculture underground Tours’. With me having a pure phobia of looking like a tourist, I was slightly spectacle at first but I was intrigued by the idea we see the behind the scenes version of Berlin, what the sightseeing tours don’t show.

Berlin has a concept where they like people to pay for what they feel they received. So the tour operates on a free basis and everyone tips at the end for what they feel is appropriate.

Artist squat

The first area in berlin we visited was the Kunsthaus Tacheles; this is in the center of Berlin and has a big art history that is currently under threat.  Squatters right in Berlin suggest once a building is occupied for ten years or more then the squatter have the right to own the building. This building has a huge history and the squatters have lived in it for over 12 years and are fighting to keep the building. With street art covering the walls and layers of history and inspiration they have made it there own and have welcomed the public to come in, donate and help protect their building.

Eastside gallery

Within Berlin they have to sections to commemorate the Berlin Wall, the wall that once divided East and West Berlin. The west side gallery contains the actual wall pieces but the east side gallery is a replica. Ten years ago the Berlin government need to attract tourists and so they had the idea to commemorate the Berlin wall falling down so they created some of the most artistic pieces and put them in the original place. The asked the original artists of the wall to repeat their work and this were received poorly and they refused the idea. And so other artists were commissioned to replicate their and hence the second replica of the Berlin wall was created, with a lot of criticism.

Street art/ street artist tags

Street art is a big thing in Berlin, the city is covered in it and not the horrible swear words and inappropriate images you get in London, but layers of artistic creations. Unknown to some, it is actually illegal to graffiti onto walls, so artists get around this my pasting paper on to walls and working onto this. Street artists have tags, certain images they repeat all over the city, and one example is Little Lucy by an unknown artist, she is found all over Berlin killing her cat in different ways.

Nike promotion

After being introduced to Berlin and graffiti we were shown a large graffiti art on a side of a central road in Mitte. This art appeared on morning in Berlin, creating a lot of press at the same time. Featuring football stars, within a mural and cupids, everyone was intrigued to how this happened and when it was closely inspected the Nike logo was seen to be surrounding the art. This shows how big brands are using a cities personality to tap into new audiences.

Unknown berlin laws

There are many unknown laws in Berlin, which were interesting to find out. 1) Many people think of Amsterdam as the cannabis capital of Europe through clever marketing, but in fact Berlin law allows for people to carry up to 15grams of cannabis legally, as opposed to Amsterdam’s 3 grams. Smoking in the street is also permitted.

It was quite noticeable that in every shop you had the option of buying alcoholic drinks, even in train and subway stations, in Berlin alcohol is allowed to be drank anywhere.

Within Berlin it is also legal to be a prostitutes, prostitutes have to pay tax and even have slot machines for there own city centre space, sort of like a car park.

You may think it is a bit irrelevant for me to be telling you these rules but is all part of the image of the young, vibrant and liberal city Berlin is.