Tuesday 13 January 2009

Autobahn Awaiting


Tomorrow marks the beginning of a 9 date tour, but I don't really feel like leaving the city. I like it here. However, to remain here I gotta make some dough and as I read of scaling unemployment rates in Berlin I'm grateful for my time as a resident.

It was a little warmer today so as I waited for my laundry to finish I took a walk over to the Oberbaumbrücke bridge where a forever game of rock-paper-scissors is being played in neon. Play spot-the-blurry-difference now!




Looking the other direction over the frozen Spree river is the t.v. tower at Alexanderplatz (as mentioned in an earlier post). There's been a recent visually-polluting addition to the city scape here in Friedrichshain called the O2- a massive new stadium with flashing billboards seen through trees 3 or 4 blocks away. I tried to avoid capturing it, but it's that glow on the right of the frame.



Along the shore at this point there also remains about 1km of the formerly East Berlin inner wall. The river, itself, belonged to the East in the no-man's-land space between the actual Berlin wall on the western banks and this inner border. There's beautiful spots all over the planet that harbour an ugly past and I've got to give Berliners credit for responding to it's history with art. This is evident almost anywhere in the city, every street and canal and even just glancing north from this spot on the bridge there's massive sculptures and installations. (We got word of an abandoned amusement park just north of where we're living so we'll be exploring the river banks a little more as the weather improves.)



In 1990, 130+ artists were commissioned to cover a portion of this remaining wall and today it stands as an open gallery known as the The East Side Gallery. Someone walked the length and youtube'd it here.

So yup, tomorrow we leave Berlin to go here:
14 Jan Elfer Music Club, Frankfurt, Germany
15 Jan Klub 007, Prague, Czech Republic (w/ aidan baker solo set)
16 Jan CRK, Wroclaw, Poland
17 Jan Kapu, Linz, Austria
19 Jan Rhiz, Vienna, Austria
21 Jan Sonic Ballroom, Köln, Germany
22 Jan Jubez, Karlsruhe, Germany
23 Jan AZ Conni, Dresden, Germany
24 Jan Schokoladen, Berlin, Germany
25 Jan Sky Hall, Kiev, Ukraine

chiz!

3 comments:

toronto craft alert said...

leah, i'm such a dork.
i checked your blog regularly in the beginning and when there were no posts for awhile i figured you were letting it go...and now i see i've been missing out on an ongoing account for your euroventures!

well i'm all caught up now and promise to be a better citizen of leah.

all my love
xjx

toronto craft alert said...

naw naw, one of the luxuries of being away is less time on the weefee. s'all good.

glad to have some connection to your voice again. and now a warmer, pinker & decidedly more acrylic sternum. thank you my dear!

leah b said...

haha yes, but it was the 70s! i got myself one too - i kinda love it. when a group of girls overheard my enthusiasm for them they scooped in started fondling the rest of her stock.

maybe becky could help, but i'd like to figure out how to make them so i could make one in cotton. if it ever happens, i'll send one your way!