Olympiastadion
(Deutsche Version)
According to popular myth: 'Every picture tells a story'. According to Roland Barthes: every photograph that 'touches' him has a punctum, a point that 'pricks' and causes him to 'feel' something. The punctum also punctuates or interrupts the mythical story, the resulting gap or pause allowing the viewer 'to enter the picture', to insert personal meaning.
I photographed the Olympiastadion with a vague idea about the significance of such a loaded, Nazi example of architecture. This study provided me with my point-of-entry in the image; it turned out to be an emergency exit from the architecture. I followed the sign of the fleeing person, the human-element so often blamed for the failure of highly-ordered systems.
Out of the stadium the streets af Berlin are also Olympian - built for
armies not individuals. It is crucial for pedestrians to observe the signal:
WALK! DON'T WALK!
In Seoul, S. Korea, an offender is being 'questioned' in the basement; upstairs, the noise accompanying tbe spectacle in the arena drowns-out his 'statement'. The spectacle is Sport, the site Olympia - and only because we no longer watch while the lions beat the Christians - both occur in an 'unpolitical' state.
The Olympic Stadium/Olympiastadion - from Berlin bei Nacht, 1987 - Cibachrome on aluminium 100x75cm
(Zoo)Logical Garden | Photographing Berlin by Night | Fast Deutsch | Olympiastadion | The Void | The Angel of History