Gröschner & Messmer : Taking Stock of Power – An Other View of the Berlin Wall

In 1995, Annett Gröschner and Arwed Messmer gained access to photographs of the Berlin Wall thanks to the Intermediary Military Archives in Potsdam. At the time of the division, the city was located in the GDR. In an archival box, the two artists discovered a large number of 35mm rolls of film taken by East-German soldiers in 1966 as the wall, which would stand for the next fifty years, was being erected. The artists were fascinated by these photos—as we are—because these are images, previously unseen by Westerners, not only of the wall, but also of the watchtowers, the barbed wire, and the guards.