Bitterfelder Straße (Grube Louise pit), 2011
BITTERFELD
After a surge of industrialization around 1900 Bitterfeld’s industries–open pit coal mining and chemical production–came to an almost sudden end with the GDR’s demise in 1990. The massive deindustrialization and mining pit’s restoration left a newly formed landscape. Nothing seem to remind the eye of yesterday’s working landscape.
BITTERFELD ist part of my longterm project ⟶ The New Wild.
BITTERFELD (Artist Book)
was published by Edition Kunstraum Michael Barthel in 2015
BITTERFELD (Field Recordings)
was published by recordings for the summer in 2014
SCHICHTEN / SHIFTS
is an audiowalk and interview project with Lorenz Hoffmann produced for the OSTEN Festival 2022.
Säurestraße (Acid Road), 2012: The street is named after the acid factory that yellow plumes of smoke were to be seem for miles. It was closed down in 1990.
Park der Chemiearbeiter (Chemical Worker’s Park), 2012: In this spot a public swimming pool used to be. It was closed down in 2001. Two years after I took this picture, the black locust trees in the background were cut off.
Bitterfeld today has a new landscape of wild growth.
Gone are the factories, power stations, industrial smog, and mining craters.
What we see today is a new landscape rising from the ashes of the industrial era.
What we see today will also one day be gone.
BITTERFELD (Artist Book)
88 pages, swiss paperback, texts in german/english; Design: Helmut Völter, Franziska Klose; Leipzig: Edition Kunstraum Michael Barthel / Franziska Klose, 2015 ⟶ 28 EUR
Bitterfeld Goitzsche, Ludwigsee, 2013: The Ludwigsee lake was a former open mining pit. Both pictures show places were brickworks and a briquetting plant used to stand.
Hallesche Straße (Deponie Freiheit IV), 2013: The depicted fence borders the former waste dump site Freedom IV. Phosphatic waste material and power plant ashes have been tipped for two decades into residual water left in a former coal pit. The site is still not restored.
BITTERFELD (Field Recordings)
recorded in former productions sites in july and august 2013. Released 2014 at recordings for the summer
Cassette, 30 min, inlay with text in german and english, typeset: Super Grotesk, 30 copies (Sold out)
Side A:
1. Chlorstraße (Chlorine Street), 2. Graphitstraße (Graphite Street) 3. Säurestraße (Acid Street), 4. Stickstoffstraße (Nitrogen Street)
Side B:
1. Alustraße (Aluminium Street), 2. Kunststoffstraße (Synthetics Street), 3. Elektrolysestraße (Elektrolysis Street)
Listen to a sample
SCHICHTEN / SHIFTS (Audiowalk)
in cooperation with Lorenz Hoffmann and former workers from the Bitterfeld-Wolfen region. Produced for OSTEN Festival 2022.
We have interviewed local people about their working experiences between 1951 an 1991. Their stories can be listened to at their places of work, most of which are now demolished.