Ποιειν Και Πραττειν - create and do

Graffiti in Germany by photographer Eduardo Fernández-Tenllado Ramminger

     

      Endzeit in Berlin  

       Photos by Eduardo Fernández-Tenllado Ramminger

 

 

Berlin

   

   Graffiti in Berlin              Photo von Eduardo Fernández-Tenllado Ramminger

One term comes to mind when slogans on the wall turn to the imperative as if something has to be done, while acting in reality as 'tranquilizers'. At least, there is this one passage in Berlin when entering NeuKöln. It goes underneath a train bridge and immediately bends to the left once coming out. No straight line here. The entire transition can be experienced as if leaving one world and entering another district. No one stands guard at this invisible border except perhaps the iron pillars upholding the bridge. Altogether they do not communicate but radiate virtually a triste atmosphere.

                         

Still, once the one part has been left behind and the footsteps no longer resound off the walls, then there can be discovered on the other side a street opening up with broad sidewalks with sufficient space for street cafes. A quick look at them will reveal a variety of restaurants: Indian, Turkish, Armenian etc. and in between bicycle repair shops or some other alternative business. All of them seem less intend to invite people in as they are already claiming to be places where insiders can cultivate further their lives around the specific themes by which they wish to address a certain style of life.

  

Compared with plants, such cultural diversity is the outgrowth of ideas. Like ivy ranking itself along the wall, many ideas accumulate over time not so much concepts for that would be too rational but rather typical items discovered when traveling to India and other exotic places. It includes tee pots, sun umbrellas, brand of soaps and various herbs besides biological food. These special shops are adjacent to particular kindergartens which derive their philosophy of education a bit from Montessori or else the Waldorf School. These are ramifications of growing up in a certain society with a layer of cult in times of affluency. Thus certain schools of thoughts are followed by those who make a productive use of specific environments in which these ideas literally flourish. Linked yoga classes and supported by texts written in the spirit of horoscopes, it is all about a future not easy to tell. Hence the demand to trust the intuition and to listen to the type of music which weighs in softly when meditating.

                        

The question can be asked what does this have to do with graffiti when something is presented in written form on the wall? Along with a special use of colours, they show a much more bizarre kind of image. While it seems that the graffiti reveale at one level of perception some kind of imaginary association, at another level they seem to express almost 'sub-consciously' the opposite of virtual reality to be found in the social media, you tube and the like. It is this kind of protest against all kinds of distortions of life which makes graffiti into a counter force to the world using images. They express a strong wish for beauty in the sense of being a claim of truth.

   

 

Once this criterion of beauty equals truth is applied upon life, and this in the broadest sense meaning life in the city, in a nation, in Europe and in a global world, a sobering up seems to creep into the image as if realizing such a life is becoming increasingly impossible. Instead of being an exception or something out of the extraordinary, graffiti has become an integral expression of the dilemma of urban life. As such there can be heard their repeated knocking against bare brick walls in search of a possible opening and therefore for an escape from a world of mere illusions and desillusionment.

   

 

Dresden

    

     "Why is the window bright red?"                                             Dresden 2014

 

 

 

"A garden of pleasure for all"

 

 

 

 

 

Munich

     

     "If you cannot read Ulysses, then you cannot live your life."     Munich 2014

 

Photos by Eduardo Fernández-Tenllado Ramminger

Text by Hatto Fischer

 

Eduardo Fernández-Tenllado Ramminger

1964 born in Zug, Switzerland

1986-93 studies of medicine in Freiburg and Berlin

1994-2003 Work as doctor in Inner Medicine, Children and Youth Psychiatry & Psycho-Therapy as well as Psychosomatic

1996 - 2005 Training in Psychotherapy

2001 - 2004 attending lectures in photography at the Art University Weissensee in Berlin

2005 - ongoing Editor for a Publisher of medical and scientific books

 

Photo exhibitions

2002 "Time Space Movement" at gallery 'Outsider Art', Aachen

2002 "Time Space Movement" at Delicut, Berlin

2003 "Ciudades / cities" at DGZ Ring in Berlin

2005 "Landscapes of Islands / Glances" Berlin

2005 "Advertisement and Environment" Gallery Tornadoe at Ostkreuz, Berlin

2012 "Germany / Kurdistan and Iraq and back" Theater of the Middle, Berlin Mitte

also since 2005 cofounder and participant of "International Open Theatre" with main purpose to advance cultural exchanges between Iraq and Germany

Contact: fernandez-tenllado(at)web.de

 

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