Iceland One-Off - The Atlantic Wall
Many of you know that when I was younger I voraciously read about WWII history. So much so that my mother had to go to the public library to get them to allow me to start reading the “adult” WWII books several years before I was allowed to enter that part of the library because there was nothing left for me to read in the children’s section. Mostly I was intrigued by the war in Europe and North Africa, but I read a bit about the Pacific war as well. Living in Europe has brought back many memories about the stories I’d read in those books. As I’ve mentioned in several blogs, not only do place names trigger memories (we live only a few miles from Arnhem, the town of “A Bridge Too Far” (book and movie) fame), there are memorials and minor historical markers all over the place in the Netherlands to remind you of the war, and then the occasional very-real structures that you surprisingly come across throughout the country. Believe me, for Europe, WWII and the Cold War are “current history” in ways Americans can’t conceive. There is a presence of that history that Europeans have not forgotten.
So for our trip through Denmark to catch the ferry to Iceland, when I realized we could leave a couple of days early (nothing as nice as finishing a work project a few days early just before vacation), I started scouting locations we might want to visit. Several locations became possibilities, and we settled on two. One was typical of the places we go to - a beautiful hilly woods that should present a nice walk and offer some potential for photographs. The other was a stretch of Danish beach that was part of Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. In the northern part of Denmark there are several locations where the bunkers have been unearthed (most were simply covered over after the war) and are accessible to the public, so we had a choice of sites.
Since we were departing from Hirtshals, we settled on visiting the Hirtshals Vest Kystbatteri - a complex of bunkers and fortifications intended to protect the harbor of Hirtshals and to prevent an Allied invasion of the beaches in the area and/or access by Allied ships to the Baltic Sea. One of the bunkers has been turned into a museum explaining the Atlantic Wall, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s role in designing the defenses, the construction effort and the effects of the Vest Kystbatteri on the surrounding area. Another bunker has been cleared and is accessible to see what it was like for the soldiers who manned it. The rest are left relatively untouched and . . . are wet, dark and, given the warning signs around most of the accessible entrances, are places you don’t want to go into.
It was at one of the bunkers that I found an image to make that is quite different than the other photographs I made that day.
I’ve revisited the image several times over the past couple of months - both to evaluate its artistic qualities and to ponder whether it has any deeper meaning.
As for meaning, I hope it’s a symbol that the type of rot and hatred that led to the creation of the Atlantic Wall will always fall to principles of humanity, equality, justice and democracy, and that history will show that it is as true today as it was then. I truly hope.
As for artistic merit, to each their own I guess. I’m still contemplating that question.