The Most Important Photo In Cold War Germany and I’ve Never Seen It

by Todd ~ May 26th, 2009. Filed under: History, Photojournalism.

The NY Times is reporting on new revelations concerning a shooting of a student protester in 1967 West Berlin. The article is accompanied by a photo of the student lying on the ground, “the shot that changed the republic.” It’s a photo I’ve never seen nor heard of. We are all in our own little bubbles no matter how hard we try to expand our horizons.

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4 Responses to The Most Important Photo In Cold War Germany and I’ve Never Seen It

  1. Edward Sanderson
    May 26th, 2009 at 11:31 pm

    I think I remember seeing this image used as an illustration for one of the essays in the MoMA catalogue for Gerhard Richter’s series “October 18, 1977″, which deals with this moment in Germany’s history.

  2. kipbot
    June 2nd, 2009 at 10:39 am

    You’re obviously in a slightly different place with your expertise and pursuits in the field, but I have recently been with younger people who didn’t know the following pictures:

    - the Black Panther fists at the Olympics
    - the Tianannmen square protester
    - the flower in the rifle barrel image
    - Kent State images/references

    For my part, and more on point, I just received a copy of Good Soldier Svejk, a book that seems to be universally read among central Europeans, but virtually unknown in the US or other parts of Europe.

    Exciting and daunting to know that there’s so much out there we’ll never know.

  3. Jamal
    June 13th, 2009 at 1:51 pm

    Have you seen this judging from your blog i thought you might like it http://www.tylershields.com/2009/05/14/spaceman/

  4. dazimon
    August 15th, 2009 at 1:56 pm

    RE: “Good Soldier Svejk, a book that seems to be universally read among central Europeans, but virtually unknown in the US or other parts of Europe.”

    Part of the problem might be the unsatisfactory translation.

    “. . . it is with a great relief and pleasure that we are hereby dutifully reporting that Book Two and Book(s) Three&Four of our new translation of Jaroslav Hašek’s The Fateful Adventures of the Good Soldier Švejk During the World War are available for sale as paperbacks at http://zenny.com.

    We hope this announcement finds you in good health and disposition and hungry for more adventures of the good soldier … after all these years.”

    More information on the Svejk phenomenon at http://SvejkCentral.com

    Also, Svejk is on FaceBook now: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Good-Soldier-Svejk/133349009873?ref=nf