After encountering a box of photos of the Berlin Wall taken by East German border guards in the mid-60s shortly after the wall was erected, photographer Arwed Messmer and writer Annett Groschner turned their research toward the topography of the 140km long structure, resulting in the sobering images now on view at Chelsea’s Walther Collection. Thirty years after the fall of the Wall, the photos speak to a failed effort at social control. This grid of ladders left behind in successful escape attempts, are an uplifting element in a show that otherwise expresses the grim realities of the wall. (On view through April 25th).
