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Public Art / Art / Videos / → All Tags

Dresden's Innovative Public Art

We're all about public art, and this awesome "intervention" in Dresden is one of the coolest installations we've seen in a long time. "Touched Echo" pipes the sounds of the notorious air raid on the Germany city through a railing on Brühl's Terrace.

Temporarily installed generators transmit the sounds of explosions and planes through visitors' arms and into their cupped ears. In other words, you have to physically lean on the rail and take cover to fully appreciate the installation.

Artist Markus Kison says that by requiring observers to participate, they create a living memorial to the bombing of the city, which killed tens of thousands of civilians just months before the end of the Second World War. His installation will remain on view--on listen?--until October 31.

Related Stories:
· "Touched Echo" [Official Site]
· Dresden: Back to '45 [Diario del Viajero, in Spanish]
· Public Art coverage [Jaunted]

World Heritage Sites / Germany Travel / Culture / → All Tags

World Heritage Travel: Sorry, Dresden

When is a bridge a divider, not a uniter? When the bridge, crossing the Elbe River and different neighborhoods of Dresden, Germany, could jeopardize the city's World Heritage recognition and damage World War II-era trees and parks.

The city's UNESCO-granted status is related not only to its historic baroque architecture and parkland design, but also to the damage inflicted during the Allied bombing of Dresden. (Read Slaughterhouse-Five if you don't know what we mean.)

A city referendum approved the bridge, which is intended to make cross-city car travel easier, but UNESCO's sudden throwing in of its lot with the bridge opponents means the structure will either have to be redesigned or that protesters sitting in trees face a very long, cold fall.

Related Stories:
· Proposal to Better Unite City Leaves Dresden Divided [NYT]
· Slaughterhouse Jive [Jaunted]
· World Heritage Sites coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: bonnaventura]

Dresden / Hipsters / → All Tags

Slaughterhouse Jive

Doesn't Dresden deserve better than an article calling it a party town? It's a cool city which we're happy to recommend--ideal for a lunch pit stop on the train between Prague and Berlin. It shouldn't be lumped in with Talinn and the rest.

If you were to turn this article into a drinking game--we're to lazy to lay out all the rules, but let's say you drink when you see something you find irritating--here's how things might develop:

Artists! DRINK: "Artists and young entrepreneurs have recently turned the neighborhood into a trendsetting, and occasionally rowdy, enclave."

Hipsters! DRINK: "The Scheune, a red barnlike structure on Alaunstrasse is a kind of one-stop-shop for hipsters."

Late-night drinking combined with brunches! DRINK: "On weekends, the cozy and chic Blumenau closes at 3 a.m. and reopens at 9 a.m., allowing scenesters to stop in for a cocktail and, after more partying, to return for the city's best cup of milchkaffee."

Weird looking youth! DRINK: "Romy Forke, 28, a saleswoman at a feng shui boutique, who wore heavy eyeliner and seemed to embody the youthful, hippie-punk ethos."

Phew. We're getting tipsy. Next week we'll read the whole Travel section this way.

[Image via allanimal/Flickr]

Related Stories:
·   Dresden's Party Scene [NY Times]