db

We had a fantastic day today. We were up early and headed to the Jewish museum. We decided to walk down and it was a two and a half mile walk in bitter cold, but it did mean we saw Checkpoint Charlie and various other interesting sights including hundreds of massive chunks of ice flowing along the top of the river Spree.

The Jewish museum was well worth a visit. It was an amazing space with loads of information. When you enter you go through an area of the ground floor which is dedicated to the holocaust and the whole experience was obviously quite harrowing. There is an area called the holocaust tower. It's a giant empty concrete tower with a small un-windowed slit up near the roof which lets in light but which you cant see through and has a ladder that is out of reach. It was freezing too and, while you couldn't call it a good space it was certainly an evocative space. I was going to blip it but I don't think a photograph could ever do it justice.

We left there about half past twelve so the students had an hour and a half to wander back up to the hotel and grab some lunch, meanwhile we walked back up th eroad via a slightly longer route to explore more of Berlin.

We met the students again at two and set out for the Hamburger Bahnhof contemporary art gallery which was really inspiring. There was loads of great stuff there but a big hit with us and the students was the db exhibition by Ryoji Ikeda. It was basically the top floor galleries on either wing which mirrored each other. One gallery was predominantly black and featured mainly light with projections on the walls and a huge searchlight sending a beam down the hall. The opposite room was predominantly white and focussed more on sound, with a massive speaker emitting a frequency which changed as you moved about the room. There was loads of other great work in other parts of the gallery and, like the Jewish Museum, I wish I could have stayed far longer. I must have walked another mile or two inside the gallery exploring. Another room which was a good experience housed works by Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, and Cy Twoombly. Warhol's picture of Chairman Mau was particularly impressive sue to the huge scale, I's seen the image loads but had no idea how big the original was until today.

If you happen to be in Berlin while the db exhibition is on I couldn't recommend it highly enough. The bookshop at the gallery, and in particular the book sale bit, was fantastic too. I could have spent a fortune but as it was I only spent thirty euros and got a great book on the Bauhaus school and Eggleston's Paris.

We eventually headed back to the hotel and relaxed for a bit before finding a nice wee tapas place for dinner and a couple of beers.

We're off to Transmediale tomorrow for the main event so early night tonight I think.