And the Berlin Wall Came Tumbling Down:
Photographer Recounts 20 Years Later
Allison Valenzuela, Sacramento City College Express, November 1999
A woman with shoulder length brown hair, highlighted in well-earned grey, is sitting behind a slide projector rapidly clicking through a carousel of slides and asking people not to look yet. “I’ve driven over 200 miles over bumps and hills to get here and I want to make sure that the slides don’t stick,” Ilka Hartmann explains.
Ilka Hartmann is an internationally renowned speaker and photographer and she was at City College November 5 in the Cultural Awareness Center to share her experiences while photographing the fall of the Berlin Wall. Hartmann, who lived in Germany until she was 24, shares some of her personal history during the presentation.
“I came here during the Civil Rights Movement. I think that because I am from Germany, with World War ll and the Holocaust in its past, my eyes were open to the suffering of other human beings,” Hartmann says.
It has been 20 years this month since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Hartmann, while showing her photographs, also shares the history of the Berlin Wall from beginning to end.
“When I heard that the wall was coming down, I just got on a plane. I needed to be there to see it and document it,” Hartmann shares. “There were so many people on the plane that had just decided to go, like me.”
While Hartmann was on the plane to Germany she was given a German newspaper. The headline read: “German chancellor exclaims ‘We are the happiest people in the world.’ “ “I still have that newspaper,” Hartmann proudly says.
Shiela Bowen, who was present at the speech, now works in the Cultural Awareness Center. Bowen transferred from EOPS. “I always missed events when working in EOPS,” exclaims Bowen. “I’m excited about this event.”
“I really enjoyed the presentation,” City College student Meghan Graham says. “It was moving to hear her personal history.”
Hartmann has a long career spanning many years and many causes. Hartmann has photographed the Immigrants Rights Movement, protests against the wars in Iraq and the Persian Gulf, the Anti-Vietnam Movement, the Black Panthers, and others.
“When you have security within yourself, seeing other photographers and their work s a great joy. You learn something, you recognize the difference, and you incorporate it into your own work,” says Hartmann. “Your eye gets opened to another person’s eye. It’s just amazing how the human mind and spirit can come up with so many different points of view.”