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Cologne bomb defusal: 'The past always catches up with you'  – DW – 06/04/2025

Cologne bomb defusal: 'The past always catches up with you' – DW – 06/04/2025

DW04-06-2025

Phil Gayle
06/04/2025
June 4, 2025
Bomb disposal experts are preparing to defuse three unexploded Second World War bombs discovered in the city of Cologne. Such finds are not unusual, over the past few weeks bombs had to be defused in other parts of Cologne, but this evacuation operation is one of the largest ever.

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Avant-garde nail art creator, Günther Uecker, dies aged 95 – DW – 06/11/2025
Avant-garde nail art creator, Günther Uecker, dies aged 95 – DW – 06/11/2025

DW

time16 hours ago

  • DW

Avant-garde nail art creator, Günther Uecker, dies aged 95 – DW – 06/11/2025

Günther Uecker was a prominent figure in postwar German art and a key member of the contemporary ZERO art movement. Nails. Thousands of completely normal nails, each one driven into a wooden board covered with linen. Some straight, some slanted, but none hammered in all the way. Sewing machines, chairs, record players and grand pianos have also borne the brunt of those little shafts of steel. Artist Günther Uecker, who has died on June 10 at the age of 95, became famous in Germany and beyond through his nail reliefs. Hardly any other artist has equally dedicated his work to the craft of simple physical labor. Even during the last years of his life, he was still hammering nails into backdrops and objects with force and precision. Günther Uecker created reliefs that he termed "nail fields." The works achieve their full effect in the play of light and shadow. Over 50 years of nail fields: Günther Uecker in 1965 Image: dpa/picture-alliance A life of war and peace Born in the of town of Wendorf near Schwerin in northeastern Germany on March 13, 1930, Günther Uecker found himself boarding up doors and windows of his family house at age 15 in an effort to protect his mother and sister from the Russian army at war's end. It was the beginning of a life-long preoccupation with hammers and nails. Post-World War II, he studied pictorial arts from 1949 until 1953 in Wismar, then in East Germany. In 1955 he fled to West Berlin and eventually found himself at the Art Academy in Düsseldorf, studying under Professor Otto Pankok from 1955-57. During his studies he encountered the artists Heinz Mack and Otto Piene and joined their artists' conglomerate named ZERO in 1961. Together they represented a "zero hour" of art untouched by the horrors of the Second World War, marking a new beginning in art history. Timeless art, nailed and painted The avant-garde artists' group made waves far beyond Germany and their time. ZERO's ideas have undergone a renaissance in the new millennium, with ZERO retrospectives staged regularly worldwide since 2004. Back in 1966, no one could have anticipated the group's future popularity. It dissolved soon afterwards, and the artists went their separate ways. Meanwhile, Günther Uecker's abstract art has been shown in over 60 countries and frequently been considered pioneering. In 2012 he became the first Western artist to be exhibited in the Iranian capital Tehran since the 1979 revolution. In 2007 came an exhibition in Beijing originally scheduled for 1994. On invitation from the Chinese government, Uecker had prepared the conceptual artwork "Letter to Beijing." In this work, the UN Declaration of Human Rights was reproduced on 19 large, freely-arranged screens, but the words were partially rendered unrecognizable by black paint. However, on short notice, the Chinese culture ministry cancelled the show in 1994, explaining that the people were not yet ready for his art. Uecker was permitted to exhibit in China 18 years later. Humanist artistic ideals "Letter to Beijing" isn't the only work in which Uecker addressed human rights violations. In "Verletzungsworte" (Words That Hurt), on display in various cities of the world since 1993, 60 words like "hitting," "despising" and "gassing" that describe physical and psychological abuse are translated into local languages and painstakingly added by Uecker to the artwork. Günther Uecker's art is understood — and esteemed — worldwide and in the most diverse cultures. Asked what makes it so universal, Uecker once volunteered his own explanation: "I'm often told that the humane character recognizable in my work stirs peoples' feelings." This article was originally written in German and is an updated version of a profile of the artist for his 90th birthday.

Germany: Cologne evacuation lifted after WWII bombs defused
Germany: Cologne evacuation lifted after WWII bombs defused

DW

time04-06-2025

  • DW

Germany: Cologne evacuation lifted after WWII bombs defused

Large areas of the city center of Cologne were closed off on Wednesday as experts defused three bombs left over from World War II, which ended 80 years ago. The evacuation operation in Cologne, which has seen plenty of them over the years, was one of the largest to ever be carried out in the city since World War II, with some 20,000 people ordered to leave the affected area. What do we know about the evacuation? The process of defusing the bombs had to be delayed at one point because of a resident refusing to evacuate, according to a city spokesperson. An individual living in the old town resisted orders to leave their apartment, with public order officials, police, and the fire department enforcing removal measures. Kai Kulschewski, head of explosive ordnance disposal in the nearby city of Düsseldorf, who is coordinating the disposal, had earlier said everything was going to plan. He had added that the defusing operation had yet to begin as of the afternoon because not everyone had been evacuated yet. "We can only start when the last person is out," he said. Hotels, care homes evacuated The evacuated area included the entire old part of the city, 58 hotels, three Rhine bridges, the town hall, the railway station in the district of Deutz, which lies across the Rhine from the city center, museums, a hospital and two care homes. The city's major landmark, Cologne Cathedral, was, however, situated just outside the danger area. Germany's national rail operator, Deutsche Bahn, had warned that many trains will be diverted or even canceled, and road traffic has was severely disrupted. The weapons — two 2000-pound (900-kilogram) bombs and one 1000-pound bomb, all manufactured in the US — were discovered in Deutz on Monday. In a statement on its website, the City of Cologne said, "The evacuation is the largest such measure since the end of World War II. Everyone involved hopes that the defusal can be completed in the course of Wednesday." Bomb defusals are nothing new in Cologne, as it was one of the major bombing targets for Allied forces during the Second World War. Among other attacks, the British Royal Air Force targeted Cologne with its first "thousand-bomber raid" on a German city overnight to May 31, 1942, dropping 1,455 tons of bombs and destroying or damaging thousands of buildings.

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