C/O Berlin — Attraction in Berlin

Not a great museum. I am a designer/artist male and went there with my wife, who does not work with art. The exposition was divided by photographer. Each had a text panel which we hoped would give meaning to the pictures, but instead, was just a CV of the person. The most uninteresting thing ever to read, for all the authors. But hey, at least the pictures are interesting right? By interesting I mean: good composition, good light, good subject matter, easy to read, topic that affects the viewer Intellectually or emotionally in some way. .... None of that. In the first part of the rather small gallery (1 hours is enough to see everything) you will see a bunch of pictures of bushes and ugly streets. All with a stupid subjective message of how man build stuff over nature. Just google: images of communistic looking buildings next to a forest. That first result page was printed and presented in this gallery as art. Me and my girlfriend did all kind of mental acrobatics to make some sense of the pictures, but NADA, we were absolutely bored by everything displayed, to the point that we just gave up trying to make meaning of the pictures and started skipping them. Imagine pictures of the most mundane objects, gas stations, ugly streets, etc...

Then, came the second part of the exposition, pictures of people. I thought, hurrah! now might be fun. You guessed wrong, it was just old pictures of random people doing random meaningless stuff. Some meaningless nudity as well. It seemed that all the pictures lacked emotion, soul. None of them looked like it took more than a minute to be conceptualized, you could easily take a picture in black and white of your family and put it there on the wall (preferably, get them to be hairy down there and naked for the pics). Again, we slowly got too uninterested to make meaning of all that meaningless subjectivity and moved on, to the next part of the exposition. The second floor.

This expo was about photography in album covers. Interesting right? Not really, aside from the little part where it shows the difference on the covers of albums before and after they got censured due to nudity, the rest was just images that you could see in any music store, or by googling "classical album covers". No explanation given, if the process, ideas, etc.. You will not be impressed, believe me. Last but not least, there was a little film playing in another room. It was about nothing... Some photographers discussing the identity changes of the work of some other photographer who passed away and whose work is a subjective mess.

Conclusion : I wanted my money back, but my girlfriend convinced me not to make a scene. I regretted later of not making a scene. Ahahha (10 euros per person is wayyyyyyyyyy to expensive for that, I would be pissed if it was for free already). I guess, I am just puzzled by the ammount of people there, specially older ones, all pretending to be intelectuals by standing in front of a picture of some bushes and buildings for 10 min. Not even the author of that picture made a meaning of it, as most images had NO TITLE. Absolutely high brow crap, like expensive wine that tastes worse than cheap wine.

Save your day, dont go to...

The worst place have ever been !!!! Very , very, very rude and unpleasant staff !!! My first visit in Berlin , this gallery was recommended by my friend, ( checked on google map and it was written that gallery was closed, but as i found it should be open today) so I risked, came happy (before were on amazing exhibition ) was smiling when entered and some “ugly face “ watching me from info desk, came still with wide smiled face hello , are you open? -Ya -oh , wow, in google maps was written, closed, so happy that you work, should be some mistaken -you don’t see ? Look around , I said already we work ya( he opened hands and was kind of screaming , looking cynically …

Avoid him, went to gift shop, after several minutes came and said -can I have one ticket please ? (It was written prices , at the same time was looking at it , so I knew the price ) -twelve euros -yes I know , already read

I paid, he took a ticket , dropped at me , I was shocked , didn’t wanted to be as rude as he was , said

“Ok thanks you, have a nice dayyy” Looked at him, was waiting for some smile on mind answer but no … more “ugly face “

Entered the exhibition and after 3 min i left the gallery, my mood was intoxicated , this piece of sh*t changed my happy holidays in Berlin When i was leaving I asked manager or someone witch whom i could talk about my accident/problem , some nice guy started talking with me and explaining that he was sorry , it shouldn’t happen , but sometimes people have bad mood or problems :)

I have a lot of problems but I don’t put my sh*t to others head , When I’m coming should try your best and not show me your negative energy … Btw , exhibition was fail… sometimes, when I , don’t lock iPhone and it takes photos in pocket, something like that, which if course i delete and for this I paid 12€ … I know whats good art, 13 years of working as a photographer and 4 years of being lecturer in arts … the picture I put here, is the only normal, for two floors...

Irvin Penn, Centennial, in Berlin : If (hypothetically) there were any discussion who is the greatest photographer of the XXst century, and with some extended knowledge, two candidates (what a word) on the really foremost ranks were certainly Henri Cartier-Bresson and on the other hand André Kertesz, born in Hungary, living in Paris and then going to the United States. Certainly, Kertesz, one of the eyes of the last century, incredible. Thus, it is absolutely worthwile (as we did) to go and see the prints of Irving Penn at c/o Berlin, an exposition drawn up for his centennial in New York (very well done). Already, if you see Irving Penn with one of his machines on a print at the entrance, you will easily understand that this is an extraordinary photographer. Certainly, a very impressive part are his portraits, of a wide range. See young and (second floor) older Truman Capote. Or Yves St. Laurent, with extraordinary spectacles, and the light is falling in a way, that you may understand that he was a kind of genius, but also subject to depression. One of the supreme, with understanding, is writer Carson Mc Cullers, and you see the pain, and much other. And to not miss Francis Bacon, the painter, taken in a most understandable way, who could do it better ?

Also, turn to the Cuzco Pictures, taken in Latin America, and you will be very close to Goya. Breathtaking, silently, and masterpieces. There are some pictures of "making of" (and a film), and it seems that Irving Penn had a feature to be friendly, to talk to the persons being photographed, having access, in a great way. Irving Penn got 90, and as some other great photographers, at the end he photographed flowers. If you are so old, you easily master flowers in colour, as you can see. There is another full month to go to c/o, as you never know when - if ever - the prints will come back. It is like with Kertesz : It make up some good 20 years of distance in time, so go now....