A Mysterious Burning Lantern in Kreuzberg

A Mysterious Burning Lantern in Kreuzberg

There she is. A lantern burning all alone. In the quietness of a Spring night in Berlin Kreuzberg. Nobody is walking around, because it is still too cold to go for a walk at night. It’s not night anymore, still it’s not day yet either. But the brightest light is without any doubt the lantern itself. Flickering like a friendly fireplace without looking damaged or vandalized at all.

This weird setting is somehow quite explanatory for the work of video artist Johannes Vogl. The Berlin-based artist creates sculptures with everyday objects and often thermodynamic manipulation. His had a bit of a viral hit on big platforms like Nowness with a video showing a burning swing.

But for me personally the burning lantern is my favorite one. Not because it is so charismatically situated at the 3-Länder-Eck where the canals of the river Spree of Treptow, Kreuzberg and Neukölln meet. It’s more the meditative and ghostly surreal effect that this video has on me that made me want to write about it. See for yourself. The burning lantern and a couple more videos by Johannes Vogl, after the jump.

Read on…