The proletarians have lost their chains!

14/8/2020 - Jena - We go to the Zeiss Planetarium, the oldest in the world and from 1926. When projectors were developed, moving celestial objects as well as fixed stars could be depicted on the inside of a dome. They sprung up everywhere in the world and knocked over the ignorant. Today planetariums are used to project anything, from stars and planets to rock concerts. The weather is unpleasantly damp, and we have half an hour before ‘Planeten, Expedition ins Sonnensystem’ starts. We walk past the botanical garden of Jena, where Goethe planted a ginkgo biloba. The ginkgo is a living fossil, over 100 million years old. Goethe was particularly interested in it. He also messed around with the flow of the Saale river, or is messing around disrespectful? He was, after all a multitalented man. The area around the Planetarium is posh and full of renovated art nouveau buildings. Lawyers, doctors and tax consultants replaced the proletarians of the GDR. I peep into a white building and see an € 8000 Eames lounge chair under a Kartell reading light. Above it hangs an abstract black and white painting. The proletarian living here has definitely lost his chains. We go back to the Planetarium for the show. The room is half full and corona ready. We wear our masks and shoot off into space and visit the galaxy and the planets. The comment is based on all space missions, retired and in progress. Mercury, Venus, Mars. Japanese, Chinese, Americans, Europeans, Russians and Indians, they are all present in space. It’s a cold, distant space and I get the shivers when I hear that Jupiter and Saturn are called gas giants and have no firm surface. I feel lonesome and vulnerable when the lights go back on.


Upmarket Jena (FDC)



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