We’ve had so many wonderful portrait series about Berliners here on iHeartBerlin in our last 15 years: The naked Berliners, creative Berliners in their homes, Berliners of the U8, Berliners through their windows during quarantine, couples of Berlin… And there are just a few that came to mind.
Today we want to introduce you to a brand new portrait series titled “Eisenacher Hundert“, and this time the concept is giving us the double whammy. Not only are all the people portrayed in this series inhabitants of the same street, they also represent all different ages between 1 and 100. So this might be the most intergenerational series we’ve featured so far.
Read on…
by Frank | People, Photos, Stories
Berliners and their apartments continue to serve as an inspiration to numerous projects, including this recent photography series portraying Berliners through their windows in times of Corona. But now more than ever, we especially need projects that aim to connect people. That’s the goal of Nomads at home – an online network for quarantined Berliners which collects their various definitions of home.
Nomads at home is a project created by the architect Zuzanna Kotecka. It’s an online space for quarantined Berliners to showcase their idea of home and connect with others, with the aim to establish ”a network of people that support each other, personally and professionally.” Each entry on the website features a particular Berliner, along with their photo, job description, country of origin and an answer to the question ”What does home mean to you?”.
Read on…
by Michalina | People, Stories
The intimate photography project comecloser.berlin is the creation of Berlin-based photographer Julia Liebisch and captures the dynamic of a variety of different couples from Berlin. Her curiosity and devotion towards authentic documentary photography lead her towards the idea of capturing people’s most precious possession – the love towards their significant other. She is devoted to capturing real life and imperfect stories, far away from the staged images, our eyes are already very used to daily on advertisement and social media.
Read on…
by Franziska | People, Stories
photos: Marga van den Meydenberg
Dutch photographer Marga van den Meydenberg has a mission: to photograph as many unique Berlin personalities as possible in her popup photo studio in Berlin. In her own words “every human being is unique and therefore a piece of art.” And this is totally true, you can see that each Berliner has added their own and unique point of eccentricity to each picture. I can even glimpse a Dalí influence in the approach of this project.
Funny, surreal, colorful, unexpected… and above all: spontaneous. Every portrait is a new surprise, a different story. Marga sees every photo as an experiment to discover how far she can go with the model. In the end, the collaboration between artist and model is the best way to create unforgettable moments. When you enter the studio, time doesn’t matter, leave your hurries behind, be willing to share all your creativity and don’t be afraid to give it a try. The more personality you show, the better.
Read on…
by Amanda Artiaga | Art, People
This is the story of an extraordinary Berliner. His childhood in a completely destroyed Post World War II Berlin definitely shaped him. In that period Wolfgang Sadowski made of, at first, simple and seemingly insignificant actions, like helping his mother cook a hot meal, an act of rebellion against the misery and decay that surrounded him. Because, in the end, our little victories will help us make it through the day. Maybe that’s why he grew up unwilling to retreat and with the ambition to conquer every moment of his life.
This passionate man whose commitment and love for sports and, especially, weight lifting has made him maintain a positive attitude throughout his life and kept him young and vital until today. Weight lifting is presented to us as a metaphor for survival, persistence and overcoming the toughest times. And accompanying the strong visuals a beautiful and delicate soundtrack that allows us to immerse ourselves in the narration and that guides us through the daily life of Wolfgang.
But this is not my story to tell. This is Wolfgang Sadowski’s story. So grab a cup of your favorite hot beverage and let yourself enjoy this short film made by Felix and Isabella Hoffmann about Wolfgang Sadowski, the strongest man of Berlin.
Read on…
by Amanda Artiaga | People, Videos
photos: Katja Hentschel
There was a time when street style was totally a thing. Every major city had a street style blog (or many) and of course also Berlin. But the trend had faded over the years a bit and many blogs stopped posting or changed their editorial concepts. Thanks to Instagram and success projects such as Humans of New York (and other cities that followed) street portraits totally had a comeback!
Glamcanyon used to be one of the major street style blogs (and to me personally the most beautiful one) in the early days of fashion blogs in Germany, but the flow of new styles dried up a bit a few years ago. Back then the blogger behind it, photographer Katja Hentschel, shifted her focus to other projects such as her follow-up blogs Travelettes and Glowbus. But a few months ago her passion for street portraits came back to life and she decided to revitalize Glamcanyon. Now you can again regularly find her beautiful photos of beautiful people from Berlin and other cities that she comes to. But with the new photos you can see how the eye of the photographer has developed over the years. Now it’s not anymore purely about the looks, it’s also about the personality of the portrayed person and the moment they had with the photographer. Absolutely charming! We selected some of our favorites from Berlin for you today.
Read on…
by Frank | Fashion, People, Photos
For the longest time of my life in Berlin the appearance of street musicians made me want to change the car of the subway or the side of the street. For some reason only the least talented people on the planet seemed to be the ones who decided to play live in public here. But in the past few years this has changed. A lot. Now all of a sudden I find myself amazed by the quality of the music that we get to hear now in the U-Bahn stations. I guess the influx of people coming to Berlin in recent time also brought some talent.
The Busker Diaries is a new video series dedicated to the most talented street musicians. The term Busker itself is pretty new to me, I guess it’s a a shorter and more sexy way to describe that you play music in the streets and make a living from the donations of the people and self-produced CD sales. Of the three episodes that have been released so far we like the first one the most with the blue-haired Katie O’Connor who makes really good folk music. Enjoy the film after the jump!
For the upcoming Berlin Festival and the Re:Publica conference the makers of the Busker Diaries are hosting open stages that still have some available slots for musicians. If you are interested you can contact them through their Facebook page.
Read on…
by Frank | Music, People, Stories, Videos
