Holy Cow – it’s a blog!

Yes, folks I’m back again – with more photos – this time from the weekend of August 23,2009. This time from Magdeburg, which I visited the second time since 2007. I’m glad I had the chance to go back as this time the weather was much better – and I got some pictures without getting soaked to the skin. Plus, this time around I was with the photo group and we spent the day wandering. It was great.

As always, the highlight of Magdeburg is the gothic cathedral, known as Cathedral of Saints Catherine and Maurice (flickr set here). The first church built in 937 at the location of the current cathedral was an abbey called St. Maurice, dedicated to Saint Maurice. The current cathedral was constructed over the period of 300 years starting from 1209, and the completion of the steeples took place only in 1520. Despite being repeatedly looted, the Cathedral of Magdeburg is rich in art, ranging from antiques to modern art. The best part of it (though this time I avoided hours photographing them) is that it has tons of gargoyles, uglies, and other stylised characters around the building both inside and out.

Other highlights from the city include:

A lovely fall view of the 3 churches along the Elbe from the High gardens next to St Mary’s Chapel. Closest is St Mary’s Chapel – built in 1315 as an extension to St. Peter’s. Next is St Petri (st Peter’s church) built in 1100’s (flickr set here) and finally, Wallon Church built in 1285 (flickr set here).
All three churches sit along the Elbe Side of the town, and at the very edge of the city walls. They acted as defensive towers and points of worship for those who were making the pilgrimage of St. John. Since they are aligned perfectly with the wall that rings the city, they seem to invite you as a pilgrim, but warn attackers away.

The Magdeburg Rathhaus (town hall) with it’s golden rider statue and

The Green Citadel by famed architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser – the summary of this 7 story building is that it’s completely green, and is supposed to make you feel good about living/working/playing/entertainment in all one place. It’s a bit of a weird color, but actually once you start wandering through it’s non comformist ways, you realize what a revolutionary building it is. My only complaint – it really does NOT fit its surroundings being that it is literally out the back door of the gothic Magdeburg Cathedral. More photos from the center of Magdeburg and this building in particular here.

So, that’s it from Magdeburg – hope to get more posted soon.

Jüterbog Day Trip

City Map (notice it’s round like the city walls)

June 6,2009 – I took a day trip to Jüterbog. It’s not too far from where I live but is a very cool place because it retains its full city walls from the middle ages. It turned out to be very gray and rainy in the afternoon, but it was a decent bike ride (after the train trip down) anyhow because it was a warm rain.
More information is at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%c3%bcterbog But the summary (interspursed with my pictures) is:

First mentioned around 1000 as a town, The town is surrounded by a medieval wall including three gateways and barbicans.

Dammtor gateway Exterior

Dammtor gateway Interior which would have been used as the militia rally/training point it was literally right outside the main city gate towers below:

Old Midevil city walls to the main city gate

The old city walls – about 8 feet high – looking back to the gate

Intact Watch tower along the city walls

Jüterbog encompasses two Protestant churches, of which Gothic St Nicholas’ (14th century) is remarkable for its three fine aisles and features a preserved coffer (chest) of Johann Tetzel, and original paintings.

St Nicholas’s Church – Juterbog was First mentioned in 1307, back then it was a Romanesque basilica. The church today is a gothic hall church – built in 3 stages which can be seen in the ground plan.
First stage – The long nave between the slanting outer pillars (1330 – in black)

Second stage – lengthening to the west, a cross beam, and the west end (1440 – grey)

Third stage – alteration of the alter apse and building of the ambulatory (1488 – light grey)

Inside – looking back toward organ

The building of the towers were not finished before the beginning of the 16th century. The different tops are due to the circumstances that the spire of the northern tower was knocked down by a thunderstorm in 1560. After that, the octagonal construction was built by taking the 30 unused altars of the catholic time as material to create room for the watch man. This baroque top was put on in the year 1617 and still adorns the northern tower.

The church survived the conflagration in 1478, The Thirty Years War, the occupation of the town by Prussia rom 1756 to 1763 in the Seven Years War, and the first and second world war almost unharmed – unlike the town and residents.

Inside, You will find a famed Madonna and Child from the 1500’s, and a statue of a black St. Maurice from the 1400’s.

and a whole set of other states that are hand carved from the 16-1700’s

Most Impressive, however, is the original side chapel – with original Painting (you need to go to flickr to see more of these) which are dark b/c of NO FLASH allowed:

Tourquoise Roof With Angels

Pilgrims to the Holy Land

Saints

Jüterbog carries on weaving and spinning both of flax and wool, and trades in the produce of those manufactures and in cattle. Vines are cultivated in the neighborhood.

Town Hall (built for the trading of flax, wool and coal).

Town Hall Ceiling

Town Hall Ceiling 2

That’s it from Jüterbog, but be sure to check out more of the set here.

Treptower Park, Molecule Man, Bridge at Sunset

(Please note that these are old imported blogs from My Space. The links may not work correctly.)

Ahh I’m so behind. I had a week off on holidays – and still have
pictures from my birtdhay trip to process. However, due to a request
from the photo group – I’m trying to get the ones from the photo group
processed and up first. So, thus the reason for multiple back-dated
blog posts on the same day. (no, it’s not your eyes – I really did
enter these in May… but out of my diary from April.)

After the trip to the Pergamon on Thursday, I wound up out with the photo
group. Initially the weather wasn’t very good – and it looked like it
was going to rain. A stiff breeze continued, but as the day wore on,
blue skies and sun decided to make an appearance and set us up for a
great sunset. Yeah, I’m loving the ToytownGermany Photography group –
we’re a good bunch of people, I’m learning alot, and well,
opportunities abound.

The photos are in the following sets:

Treptower Park & Communist Memorial

Molecule Man (Random Art statue)

Oberbaumbrücke & East side Graffiti

Highlights from them include the following:

Soviet Soldier Kneeling (notice the other through his boot)

Treptower Park, Monument and Memorial (at the far end, center)

Tilted Communist Flags (with kneeling soldiers – notice the hammer & sickle at the top of flag)

The Soviet Soldier – caring enough to stop in the middle of battle, pick up a (his?) lost child, and fighting.

You can actually go up the stairs to view inside the above monument –
it’s Russian, and says something about dedicated to those who fought
facism and died.

Inside the memorial

From there, we walked along the river Spree and up to the Molecule Man
statue. It’s 30 meters tall (4 stories), weighing 45 tons, and made of
aluminum. This statue is the brain child of American artist Jonathan
Borofsky and has been in the Spree River since 1999. With 3 aluminum
“men” that unite to make a whole, the artist reminds us “that both
people and molecules exhist in a world of probability and that the aim
of all creative and intellectual traditions is to find wholeness and
unity within the world”.

Molecule Man x3 Composition

There’s more in that set including an abandoned ship and a few other highlights but that’s the main thing in there.

After a few minutes, we continued along the East side where there is
lots of Urban art (when does graffiti turn to urban art? When it looks
like this!!)

I Love You, earflaps

The Ravers

Flying Fish – (airplane with fish?)

Solyent Green Is Humans (full building)

Solyent
Green is Humans (close) This is some famous graffiti artist – and it
was a statement on how People cannibalize each other in more ways than
one. Kinda creepy but cool. It’s visible from the Ubahn as you go by.

Not long after, the sun started to set, I decided to take photographs
of a beautiful bridge known as Oberbaumbrücke. There’s lots in this set
worth viewing! Anyhow, This was destroyed in WW2, but built back up to
resemble how it looked before…. with a series of towers based on an
ancient one in a town north of Berlin – Prenslau. A Ubahn runs across
the top of the bridge, and cars on the bottom.

Sunset behind Oberbaumbruecke Silhouette(notice the train on top)

Arched walkway for pedestrians

View of the TV tower at Alexanderplatz from Oberbaumbrücke

From there, I headed over to have a Doener with Paul and then home,
knowing that the Next weekend would be yet more photography – because
it’s a 3 day weekend.

** Several of these are available as prints for sale in my store!**

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Jüterbog Day Trip

Treptower Park, Molecule Man, Bridge at Sunset