DER TOD UND DAS MÄDCHEN

Part III of “The Heart of Darkness” project is installed in the subterranean cavernous space of the former Königstadt Brewery in Berlin. The descent to a Stygian underworld, the experience of cold clammy dampness, the smell of mold and muted sound, the absence of natural light makes for a haptic unforgettable experience. In this space Ukrainian women slave labor assembled parts of the V2 rocket, the “wonder weapon” of the Nazis on one side, while Berliner civilians sought refuge from the air raids of the Allies on the other side. This cruel absurdity of the use of this space during WWII inspired me to an encompassing interpretation of the Totentanz theme of Matthias Claudius’ celebrated poem Der Tod und das Mädchen (Death and the Maiden).

The installation of over 100 black and white and color analog photographs has a dual structure: Life/Death, Destruction/Rebirth, Victim/Victimizer, Nature/Women and Men, East/West, Flowers/Bombs, Magda Goebbels/Sophie Scholl - they all dance a Pas de Deux to the basic theme of the installation: who represents Death and who is the Maiden. It is also a Danse Macabre of lesser acknowledged victims of recent history - the victims of Imperial Japan, of Bolshevism, the Roma and Sinti in the “Third Reich”.

I intentionally strive for beauty in my photographs of landscapes of battlefields and other sites of conflict because beauty has the power to open the heart and thereby make the viewer more receptive to the compassionate message of “The Heart of Darkness” Project. The beauty of the landscapes is meant to instill in the viewer the desire to protect Nature, to treasure all Life and to declare War on War — because war is ugly.

Each segment of the “Heart of Darkness” has its own color code. The color code for Der Tod und das Mädchen is all shades of blue. Ice blue as the frozen heart of the Leni Riefenstahl, the pale blue White Nights over the Gulag archipelago, the cold mist and smoldering ashes after the fires are extinguished the morning after an air raid, the baby blue of the Forget Me Nots and the deepest blue of the scarf of memory woven by Anna Akhmatova.