Punctum and Points. Weißensee Cemetery
I first visited the Jewish cemetery in Weissensee shortly after our family moved to Komponistenviertel. Cleared near the main entrance, closer to the far end, the cemetery looked like a jungle from Kipling, devouring the abandoned city.
Many of the gravestones spoke a language that lacked letters. The letters had been knocked down, shot at, stolen. Shrapnel had hit the letters. р, ivy had gnawed away at the soft limestone, seeking out unevenness, and found the letters.
From natural losses and damage, from fragments of broken slabs, from traces of vandals and looters, a new language of visual symbols emerged. The stories told by these writings are no less real than the names and dates on the stone.
I wrote down what I saw.
