During Green Week 2012, the whole Fair Ground is illuminated with green light. During last year’s Green Week (and also during ITB and IFA), only the Funkturm (Radio Tower) was illuminated, but it seems that this year they’ve added a little extra light.
The Potsdamer Platz is famous for its events, movie premieres and festivities, but what I saw yesterday was a bit different, 3 big yurts were standing in the middle of the Sony Center, in front of the CineStar Event Cinema. Yurts are portable, bent wood-framed dwelling structure traditionally used by Turkic nomads in the steppes of Central Asia, so it was quite interesting and I wanted to know what’s going on there.
Two of the yurts were closed, the third one had a sign, “Info Yurt”. I went in and was told that the yurts are being used by 35 authors, reading chapters of their books in front of an audience of about 25 people, as part of an event called “Readings in Yurts”. After the reading, they could ask question about the book and the author, probably because there were a lot of students in the audience. I was also told that it was last day of this event but they will be back next year.
Once again, one of the largest illumination festivals in the world, the Festival of Lights, takes place in Berlin and world-famous landmarks and monuments are dressed in spectacular light. German and international artists and lighting designers present extraordinary illuminations, light art and creative designs. All 81 illuminated buildings will shine in different colors until October 23th daily from 7:30pm till 0:00am.
I will update this article with more pictures during the next week.
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To commemorate the 150th anniversary of the relationship between Germany and Japan, light was used to project the word “Peace” in languages from around the world on Berlin’s most representative landmark, the Brandenburg Gate. One program, 2 different Parts, with orchestral music and an amazing art-light-show, enchanted hundreds of visitors for about 30 minutes.
Berlin, Pariser Platz, 27°C, a small helicopter is hovering above the Brandenburg Gate, suddenly a group of GSG9 Special Forces is jumping out of the helicopter, attached with a parachute and a smoke flare gun. Thousand of tourists waiting for them to land in the middle of the Pariser Platz right in front of the Brandenburg Gate.
The Berlin Federal Police celebrated its 60th Anniversary yesterday on August 20th 2011, with a big street festival and the GSG9 paratroopers as a special event.
The Stadtschloss, in English the Berlin City Palace, was a royal palace in the centre of Berlin. It was the principal residence of the Hohenzollern Kings of Prussia from 1701 to 1918 (the German Emperors from 1871 to 1918) and a museum following the fall of the German Empire in 1918.
Damaged by Allied bombing in World War II, although possible to repair at great expense, the palace was demolished in 1950 by the GDR authorities, despite West German protests. Following the reunification of Germany, it was decided to rebuild the Stadtschloss.
The new Castle will be named Humboldt Forum and will be rebuilt as a replica of the former Baroque building. In the meantime a big blue box, called HumboldtBox, will cover the empty space right beside the Berlin Cathedral. If you want to know more about the whole project, just visit the exhibition on the first floor, or if you just want to relax, the restaurant on the fifth floor provides you a 360° panoramic view over Berlin.
Since 1992 every summer the Gendarmenmarkt in the heart of Berlin turns into a great concert arena and yesterday was the last day of this years event. This summer was the 20th anniversary of the Classic Open Air Festival and it ended with a special concert, the soundtracks of the James Bond Series performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra London.
Dominique Horwitz will accompany you on a musical voyage though almost half a century of Bond movie history, under direction of the American conductor Carl Davis, London’s world-renowned Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the British singer Mary Carawe.
The whole place was filled with music and people enjoyed the concert sitting in the warm evening sun, drinking a beer, eating an ice cream, even without buying a ticket.
Oh and I tried to record it with my DSLR, check it out:
The legendary tourist attraction Art House Tacheles was closed last month after serving as a home for many artists from around the world for more than 20 years and I went there to take a couple of pictures before the whole thing will be demolished in the near future.
The Kunsthaus Tacheles was an art center and nightclub that was opened in East Berlin after the Berlin Wall came down in the spring of 1990. Tacheles is a large (9000 square meter) building on Oranienburger Straße in the district known as Mitte. The exterior of the building was damaged from shelling in World War II, and much of the damage was never repaired. Huge, colorful graffiti-style murals are painted on the exterior walls, and modern art sculptures are featured inside.
The Kunsthaus was formerly a department store in the Jewish quarter (Scheunenviertel) of Berlin, next to the synagogue, it was originally called Friedrichsstadtpassagen. After serving as a Nazi prison, the building was taken over by artists, who called it “Tacheles”, Yiddish for “straight talking.”
Last year, I mentioned that Berlin’s Siegessäule (Victory Column) is under construction. Now, the scaffold was removed and the golden Statue of Victoria again shines in all her glory in the middle of the Great Star.
During the refurbishment works, about 1200 gram of gold leaf were put on the bronze sculpture of Victoria, which is 8.3 meters high and weighs about 35 tons. If you want to pay her a visit, you have to climb 285 steps upstairs to reach the observation platform on top of the monument. There is no elevator but your effort will be rewarded with a great view on Berlin Tiergarten.
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe is a construction which was build on 1st April in 2003, well let’s say they began to build it, because the last stelae was erected on 15th December in 2004.
The Memorial, which contains 2,711 stelaes, covers a vast area of 19.000 m² and can be found near the Brandenburger Tor in the middle of Berlin
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in the centre of Berlin is Germany’s central Holocaust memorial site, a place for remembrance and commemoration of six million victims.
The Memorial consists of the Field of Stelae designed by architect Peter Eisenman and the underground Information Centre and is maintained by a Federal Foundation.
