Yesterday was my day to visit the big art galleries in the Kulturforum, the gaggle of museums plus the Philharmonie on the south-west edge of the city centre (Mitte): but the art to be preceded by some photo opportunities. So I was up early and out by 6:40 for the simple journey to the Brandenburg Gate to try to get the photos I failed to get last time because of a concert there. It rained heavily in the night and the weather was grey and very dull, not the bright July sunshine I'd expected.
And when I got there I found people cleaning up after another event the night before. I did my best with the camera and moved onto the Reichstag, where I wanted to get to the Norman Foster dome. It opens at 8:00 and I was there at 7:50, but noted that you now have to book online in advance. Luckily I had my passport with me and the nice lady on the gate let me in anyway. But they're working inside the dome so it's not possible to go up the spiral path inside at present; I made do with photos of the outside. The wind up there was very cold.
A couple of short bus journeys, to save my aching feet, to the Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand (Memorial to German Resistance), which is a huge and absorbing collection of photos and documents covering resistance to the Nazis. Visited the office of Stauffenberg, the officer who attempted to blow up Hitler. Stayed an hour, following the audio guide.
Walked to the Kunstgewerbemiseum (Museum of Applied Arts) to see a superb collection of European glass, ceramics, silver and furniture from the Renaissance to the 1960s. In an hour and a half it had to be a flying visit, but well worth it
Another short bus trip away from the Kulturforum to the Martin-Gropius-Bau, a building designed by Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius's uncle, to see a major 300 print exhibition of work by the Hungarian photographer André Kertész, one of my photo heroes. Another hour and a half...
After some domestic work – i.e. finding a bank, a surprisingly difficult thing to do in Berlin – I bussed back to the Kulturforum and the Neue Nationalgerie, the wonderfully simple building designed in 1965 by Mies van der Rohe, which houses a huge collection of 20th century paintings. The current exhibition, the first of two showing the collection, is called Modern Times (Moderne Zeiten) and covers 1900-1945. There was a lot that I liked, and I took many notes in the two hours I was there.
Finally, at 6:00pm, to the Gemäldegalerie (literally ‘Picture House’) – there's method in my madness as the last two galleries are open late on Thursdays – for a fabulous collection of early European paintings, with all the big names, and many others, from the 15th to the 18th centuries. But by 7:30 I'd run out of energy, despite stocking up on Sachertorte during the afternoon, so had to call it a day. Luckily I managed to get a table at my favourite Berlin restaurant.
Comments