Berlin Street Art.

[sister_luck]

I don't have many words today - too tired, because I got to meet thirty new little people today (and some of their parents), but I want to give you some Berlin walls.



Let's start with the East Side Gallery next to the River Spree. It's one of the few remaining sections of the Wall and after the fall of the wall a series of paintings appeared there. Most of them are damaged quite badly and restoration efforts have proved futile, because people just write and paint and spray all over them again. But then I think that most of these paintings aren't that great anyway.

Here's one of the original artworks (my father says it's a portrait of Tucholsky) with a newer wheatpaste addition next to it:



The riverside is decorated with some modern pieces. A bit boring and generic, but colourful.



A stencil of a woman's thoughtful face next to some crumbling artwork:



It's an everchanging place, as you can see from these three faces that can be found at the entrance of the lefty/alternative beach bar where we had a refreshing lemonade.

In my icons you can see two of the three faces as they were two years ago!







"Beach" graffiti:



Notice the table football table. Weirdly enough we call it Kicker in German while the Americans have corrupted our good word for football and say foosball.

Beach monkeys:



Other random finds:



I'm not sure whether this is a genuine above arrow. Check out the stuff on his website (which is quite a navigational experience). I really like what he does.

Comments

[comava.livejournal.com]

I never thought to wonder how a foosball table might be called in German, even though I'm well aware that our Swiss German word for it couldn't be similar at all - we call it a Töggelichaschtä. A Chaschtä is a box and Töggel means... well, like a little prop toy, like the little figures you use for board games and such.

I knew those green faces looked familiar! ;)

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

And I never thought to wonder about the Swiss German name - I assumed Kicker was used in all German speaking countries!

[kazzy-cee.livejournal.com]

I find it interesting that there is so much 'artistic art' but then someone has just scrawled what we would call their 'tag' next to it in spray and it's a shame. I'm thinking particularly of the second picture from the bottom (the one with the stencil girl). It spoils the attempt at decoration IMO.

Although I do love the true graffiti modern huge tags too :)

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

I don't mind the tag next to the girl so much - it might even be the artist's signature, but generally speaking tagging can be very annoying.

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

We call it "kicker" too, and use the verb "kickeren".

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

Oh, and good luck with the new school year. I always find it so sad you don't have that many weeks off...

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

Hmm, that's interesting, same word in Dutch but a different one in Swiss German.

Thanks for the school wishes - it was a tiring day today but it's a lot of fun. As to holidays: six and a half weeks is enough I think.

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

Maybe it's just what you're used to. We get two months, and when it's my birthday I'm halfway through, a week later I start "prepping". So when you're talking about going back to school, I'm all "I'm still on holiday!"