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Eric Fichtl
<p>A woman waits at a level crossing in Buenos Aires.</p>

Thanks for visiting. This website features my photography, writing, and a bit about me.

PHOTOS

Here is a random sample of my photos. Visit my galleries for many more.


<p>People gather on the tiered walls below Prague Castle to take in the view back over the city.</p>
<p>A detail of the crumbling masonry that once enabled the Great Wall to traverse the terrain of imperial China's border. I understand these sections have been restored since this photograph was taken.<br /></p>
<p>This little guy (he is a male) was up atop Table Mountain. Such a colourful species!</p>
<p>With the camera positioned just so, this neoclassical cupola appears to sit proportionally atop a modernist base in the heart of Potsdam. It kind of works. <br /></p> <p>They are, though, two separate buildings. The dome belongs to the St. Nicholas Church, which dates from the mid 19th Century when Potsdam was part of the Kingdom of Prussia. In the foreground is the facade of the Institut für Lehrerbildung 'Rosa Luxemburg', a teacher training academy built in the 1970s when Potsdam was part of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).</p> <p>This view no longer exists. <br /></p> <p>A 2010 decision by Potsdam city officials ordered the dismantling of the Institut, which duly occurred in 2017. It is to be replaced by a new structure that will recreate the facade of Prussian palace while masking a contemporary interior – the rationale being to create an architecturally harmonious setting on a key central square. <br /></p> <p>Sound familiar? Berlin also recently opted to remove the DDR-era modernist Palast der Republik (itself built on the site of a Prussian palace the East German government had demolished for its symbolic associations with the imperial past) and erect a simulacrum Prussian palace (the Humboldt Forum project). </p> <p>These decisions – which evoke one history while erasing another – are a continuation of Germany's highly contested reckoning with its past, as Brian Ladd explores in his excellent book, <em>Ghosts of Berlin: Confronting German History in the Urban Landscape</em>. For some, the frequent consensus for neoclassical lines among politicians and urban planners is a canny dodge reflecting a certain conservatism – it seeks to escape the extremes of the 20th Century (including their manifestations in architecture) by locating historically safe ground in the perceived unity of the imperial Germany of the Kaisers. But that preference is a hagiographic illusion (the clue is in the word 'imperial'), and opts for an allegorical amnesia over a challenging architectural response to the complexity of the German experience. <br /></p> <p>There is something incredibly uninspired (not to say regressive) about rebuilding long-gone imperial palaces on sites where the ground is both hallowed and historically contested. And as beautiful as neoclassical facades may be (and Berlin and Potsdam have plenty of them to show off), as 21st Century new-builds they are dated symbols that fail equally at capturing nuanced historic legacy and at presenting the forward-looking aspects of contemporary German society. </p>
<p>A man arriving home in Havana.</p>
<p>An autumn afternoon on Berlin's Oderberger Strasse.<br /></p>
<p>A commuter catches some some shut-eye on one of Buenos Aires' vintage subway carriages. The system dates from 1913, while the wooden cars on Lí­nea A were built only a few years later and are still in use.</p>
<p>A somewhat unorthodox take on Toronto's tallest tower.<br /></p>
TEXTS

A lot of what I write professionally carries no byline. Here are some of the works I have put my name to.

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Washington’s New Weapon in the War on Drugs

Washington’s drug warriors claim Fusarium oxysporum will eradicate illicit crops in a “tested, environmentally safe” manner.
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On Laura Alcoba's 'The Rabbit House'

A unique exploration of a childhood interrupted by the onset of dictatorship and widespread repression.
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On Robert Skidelsky's 'Keynes: The Return of the Master'

Skidelsky offers an accessible introduction to the work of John Maynard Keynes