"Ask yourself a question that cannot be answered with a simple Yes or No.
Make your way to the colour that attracts you most at that moment and 2,500 years of ancient wisdom will answer your questions."

This is the call that will in future meet the visitor in various languages at the entrance area of the Mehringplatz Square.

Ideas of tolerance and peace are conveyed in a playful way by The Berlin Oracle.
An interest for other cultures will be awakened and different life perspectives will be recognised.

Formerly known as The Belle-Alliance Platz, The Mehringplatz used to be in the same prestigous league as the Pariser Platz at the Brandenburg Gate and the Leipziger/Potsdamer Platz as little as sixty years ago. It used to be one of the most lively and beautiful Squares in Berlin before its destruction during the Second World War. The proximity of the Berlin Wall was however responsible for the Square’s loss in significance. Now, since the fall of the Wall it has begun to grow in importance again.

The initiator of the venture, Bonger Voges, has developed a concept for a comprehensive artistic work, based on the history and the social and urban conditions of the Square.

A monumental gate sculpture by the artist Niki de Saint Phalle will symbolically depict the historical southgate to Berlin.

Installed on the roofs around the buildings that encircle the Square are huge metal flags that follow the order of the colour spectrum. The colours reflect the many-sidedness of all cultures and their peoples, thus symbolising the harmonious whole that exists from many smaller parts. It serves the additional function of representing the sixty-four hexagramms of the I Ching.

The colour chosen by the visitor will lead him to a plaque on the ground, designed by the artist Helge Leiberg. On this plaque he will find inspiration from the I Ching, a 2,500 year old book of Asian wisdom, and the oldest text on the art of communication.

Heading to the installation through the pedestrian zone of the Friedrichstrasse the visitor will find life philosophies of European personalities such as Vaclav Havel, Nils Bohr or Ingeborg Bachmann - people who represent human value and the realisation of a vision (Path of Visionaries). They stimulate tolerance, understanding and self-vision. What lies beneath all this is an encouragement to communicate, develop new life perspectives and be influenced by human values.

More detailed information about the art venture is available at the exhibition:

“The Berlin Oracle and the Path of Visionaries "
Kunstwelt e.V. Berlin npo. – Friedrichstraße 4 - 10969 Berlin
Tel:+49/ (30) 252 94 677, Fax: +49/ (30) 252 94 688

Underground Hallesches Tor, Opening Hours: Mon.-Fri. 11am. – 5pm. Free Entry

back