For my research on Tears of the Eyewitness I met some civil rights activists in Leipzig, those who were on the streets at the very beginning. For them, the fall of the Wall was the end of every utopia. Capitalism began its triumphal march. They didn’t want chancellor Helmut Kohl, that was the mop in the street who didn’t dare to demonstrate until late. The narrative of  „a subjugated people rearing up for freedom and democracy“ is bullshit. I think most people just wanted to consume stupidly. But the vanguard of civil rights activists, the ones who started it all, they sank into insignificance.“ — Sven Johne


Tears of the Eyewitness, 2009
HD-projection, English with German subtitles, 22:30 min.
ed. 5+1 a.p.

Tears of the Eyewitness puts its focus on the construction of history and memory. We see an actor, around forty years old, meet a motivation coach in his early twenties, who has experienced the fall of the wall only through images and narrations. By recalling the dramatic events in Germany in 1989, the young coach tries to appeal to the actor’s personal memories of the time and evoke ‚real feelings‘ in him. A strange interplay develops between the artificial and the candidly felt emotions, between the memory influenced by media and by personal experience.