A stencil cut out of Berlin

Small breakfast at Berio whilst listening and singing along to Dean Martin, this always reminds me of Philip Collyer, probably because I know he would appreciate the moment most. It’s a beautiful clear day, if a little cool, so we head off to KaDeWe before the crowds, to see if we can get a new apron for Jason. The truth is, we really wanted to grab a seat in the food department and have a hot chocolate, just because we can. Beautiful, rich and silky hot chocolate with cream on top is a grand way to kick off the day.

As we were travelling on the Underground to Alexanderplatz to begin our “Street Art of Berlin” walking tour, we saw Raz in standing out in his red pants, red hoodie and bright yellow high top sneakers. He’d had a big night with Kate at an old East Berlin bar, but was still sprightly enough for the tour.

We arrived at Alexanderplatz and are cordially greeted by our guide Rob, who grew up in Perth and asked if I was wearing a Hawthorn scarf or were the colours by coincidence. The latter I replied. He then proceeded to tell me, as we were catching the train to our first stop, that he also was a supporter, but had been out of the loop since moving to Berlin. “How did we go this season” he questioned to which I casually replied “We won the Grand Final and it was awesome”. All is good.

The first piece of street art was a 6 story high stencil of an astronaut by Victor Ash on the side of a building. At night the flags from a car dealership across the road would cast a shadow on the wall and give the appearance that our cosmic friend was holding one of them. Clever.

Rob was extremely knowledgeable and not only gave us a potted history of graffiti and street art in Berlin, but also across the world. Furthermore he covered the different types of graffiti including tagging, throw ups and the ‘piece (short for Masterpiece). Each is a development phase for the ‘writer’.

We walked, talked and caught trains and trams to get a broad perspective of the different pieces and artists in Berlin. Many artists were requested to post pieces as part of the ‘Back Jump festival’ including Roa, Au Cherium and Alias who is known for creating stencils of children in distressed or uncomfortable situations. All these are displayed at eye level  of children, to assist them and the viewer in questioning the kind of world we are creating and leaving for them.

After covering some of the amazing work, we were escorted to an old warehouse which was their new gallery and workshop, to create our own stencils and art. It provided me with the opportunity to share my perspective of tagging with Rob, in which we had a robust, but civil discussion around when does it just become meaningless noise and when does it add to the aesthetic of the area. It appears that we weren’t too far away from having common ground on this.

After creating our stencils, we then created our ‘pieces on a small canvas. This would not only test our own creativity, but also give us a little memento to remind us of this unique, but completely enjoyable alternative tour to Berlin. Thanks for organising the tour Raz.

Finally, our exhausted feet needed a rest and our grumbling stomachs needed satiating. We returned to Nollendorf Platz with Raz and Kate and had a wonderful schnitzel dinner at Ess Werks whilst we shared our favourite experiences of the day and set out our plans for tomorrow.