Vom Car Tex an den Meeresgrund
Störtebecker Denkmal - Tina Henkel
Motorbike spare parts business, MINI Hamburg Süd, Landesbetrieb Verkehr Hamburg Mitte, Verkehrsamt Hamburg, ASH Autoschilder, Autoschilder Zulassung Holger Slabik, Auto Shop Hamburg, Citroën.
I ride my bike down Süderstraße. What's wrong with it is the bicycle. That's what I think. The driver of a Ford Transit overtakes me and pulls in just in front of me, letting me know that I don't belong here. On my right is Car Tex, on my left Autopflege und Reinigung mit System. Then comes Auto Schilder Discount, A&N Autolackierung, Peugeot, Euro Master, Europcar, Alaa Eddine Car Service. It becomes more industrial. The car dealerships lose their names, in some places there are still notices like 'Purchase all kinds of cars'. Then, on the horizon, the Victory Column. Wait, wrong, wrong city, wrong corner. I'm approaching a huge street monument. What looks like a partnership between the big star in Berlin and the Dämonium, the world's largest mobile ghost train, is, when I look up again, a granite column on whose capital a two-master is enthroned or floating or driving. Quite a lot of pomp. The presumed periphery is broken by a ship whose bow is pointing towards the Elbe and the harbour about 20 metres above me. Weird. In the roundabout around the column, the driver of a Mercedes vintage car gives way to me. He circumnavigates the roundabout without power steering. The picture looks more appropriate than the clash that arises between me, in a Weekday zip-up from the last season of 2022, the neighbouring flat hotel from the 80s, which looks a bit like Baltic Sea flair, and the completely insane Störtebekerhaus. Clinker brick, ornamental stone, sandstone, granite, playful architectural details, coats of arms, clocks, flags, a glockenspiel replaying the beheading of Störtebeker and other sailors, something golden and plastic windows. From a distance, early 20th century, but here, up close, you quickly unmask the reconstruction architecture from pre-war Hamm, from 2005. I think the negation of war in architecture is dangerous. On the ground floor, an Indian snack bar selling pizza and pasta and a car rental agency. Fortunately, there is also a car index in the Störtebekerhaus. Matching the upper-class appearance is the upper-class car rental: Starcar.
I look up into the sky at the ship again. It looks so fake and artificial, like something from Playmobil. Wolf Vostell's Two Concrete Cadillacs would have been more appropriate, I think, after all the car content on the stretch of Süderstraße I've covered. I am no longer alone in feeling out of place. Why my bike, why the ship?
I sit down on the roundabout and watch the traffic.
Slow driving school cars alternate with expensive SUVs. Occasionally a truck turns into the roundabout, or the 112 bus. Then it gets crowded on the sea lane around my little island. A Mercedes from Neumünster, a Mercedes from Hamburg, a van from Winsen Luhe.
The ship above me and the cars, leaves us bobbing at the bottom of the sea. The metal bodies float around like wrecks and disappear north, east, south and west into the exits of Borstelmannsweg and Süderstraße. I remain on my traffic island. A bell tower sounds in the distance. I don't know of any church nearby, but for a brief moment I can quite easily think myself back to the 14th century, or whenever Störtebeker was on the road like that. I encounter him surprisingly often. But I don't quite understand his heroisation. In East Frisia, where I grew up, he had a romance, on Rügen there are these festivals dedicated to him, in Budni they sell Störtebeker Atlantik Ale and in Hamburg he was executed. Some people think his piracy was cool, others enjoy having his head cut off, others celebrate the unbeatability of his subsequent 12m walk without a head.
A Mercedes, a Škoda, a Ford, a Mercedes. I feel safe on my island, four cannons installed on small wooden trestles protect me and Störtebeker's phallic column from cars and other dangers. The four cannons are aligned compass-like. Everything is so symmetrical. I discover small inscriptions on the cannons. Each cannon has a name. They are called Égalité, Fraternité, Liberté and Hammonia.
Égalité fires at the Apartment Hotel
Fraternité fires at Süderstraße 259
Liberté the Alfred Ernst & Co. forwarding agency
Hammonia the Störtebekerhaus
Aha okay, French Revolution. 1789, I think. Declaration of Human Rights. And Hammonia, I know her from Hansaplatz, the female Hamburg city goddess.
I google ‘Störtebekerkreisverkehr’ and find three entries at: www.stone-ideas.com, at drone-forum.de and at Submission-Anzeige. In the drone forum, Jens writes under his Störtebeker roundabout shot that he once filmed it 'by the way' when he was driving home from the Harley Days. Stone-ideas.com and Submission Anzeiger are more revealing. The column is made of black polished gabbro. It rises on a base of dark red granite G804. The construction was commissioned and planned by Achim Becker.
"Please come in!"
"The landlord is Achim Becker. The businessman became rich by trading in stamps, later in coins and gold."
"Here we have once 10 ducats Hamburg, with the city silhouette of Hamburg, costs around 20 - 25,000 euros. Then here we have the most expensive German silver coin, from 1917. 100 pieces were minted here, costs around 70 - 100,000 euros today."
"Störtebeker is something like his role model. At least as far as the procurement of his goods is concerned. To pounce like a privateer on the opportunities when they arise."
I have a problem with money. Especially with coins. They are everywhere. At the bottom of my backpack, in trouser pockets, flowerpots, in the washing machine, in the deep gullies between the floorboards, rarely in my wallet. As long as it surrounds me everywhere, everything seems to be OK. Achim Becker might see it differently. Who knows what glorious, rare collector's euros I've missed out on. My grandmother might also see it differently. Before the euro was introduced, she already owned it. That must have been a few weeks, maybe even months, before the official introduction. I remember sitting in her kitchen as a child and Herbert, the neighbour, bringing over the first euro coins in a little velvet bag. The most exciting was the 5 euro note. Everyone was a bit wistful towards the 5 mark piece, but also curious and proud of the fresh money. That was the beginning of their fascination with coins. I, in turn, was fascinated by her passion for collecting. She bought a book, the Euro Collection, in which every euro from every country was pre-printed, with a passe-partout-like cover, into which you could later press the euro exactly when you found it.
That my grandmother took up coin collecting as a hobby is and remains grotesque. My grandmother has no money. She never earned anything in paid work, nor was she concerned about investing in anything or owning things. Everything she needed to live was grown herself, preserved in various ways, bartered, or bought from the discount store with my grandpa's small pension. The visit to the discounter happens very rarely, however, because she has mastered the practice of commoning very well. Then she hopes for a small sign at the checkout that shouts: Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité, a head of King Juan Carlos the First or Willem Alexander. A piece of Greece, Slovenia or Belgium in her hands.
My grandmother has never travelled. She knows the countries from television or from the euro coin. Only once did she cycle to Emsland, 100 kilometres away. Out of holiday-cluelessness and the unknown overload of relaxation, of doing nothing, my grandma and grandpa collected deposit bottles. I hope that the change they redeemed contained a rare coin from Vatican City.
Achim Becker says "Some people buy a car for 125,000 euros, or a sailing yacht, or go on holiday. I don't do all that."
"His motto for getting rich: First the diligence, then the price."
I'm still sitting on Achim Becker's prize. It is late summer. But at the roundabout in Süderstraße, the season doesn't matter. A painful feeling surrounds me. Everything is artificial and deliberately planned. There are no voids, no spaces, no nature. Eis Gino drives by and rings the bell in the forwarding agent's car park, no one wants an ice cream, Eis Gino drives away again. 4 men in very clean Nike trainers enter the Störtebekerhaus. Another man with an E-Viper walks past.
I wonder where these people come from, what they are doing here. Whether they had lunch at the Indian snack bar? Whether they want to rent a car from Starcar? Whether they have booked a weekend trip to Hamburg and let themselves be led into the industrial area by the advertising promise of the Apartment Hotel Hamburg Mitte? A housing estate of Hamm-Süd starts behind the roundabout. Roundabouts at the entrances to towns are designed in the traffic logic to slow drivers down and, of course, to let them turn and avoid traffic lights. At the roundabout, it doesn't matter what slows you down. It can be a concrete block, a tall greenery, or even art. It doesn't matter what it looks like. The daring thing about roundabout art is to find the fine line between striking and boring. Drivers should notice that it is worth braking because an obstacle is coming. But drivers should not be so distracted that they devote all their attention to the artwork. So, what is too irritating, too complex and multi-layered, falls through the roundabout ethos. I've always found life in the countryside to be strikingly boring in itself. That one is struck by the conspicuous boredom is not so easy, at least for me. In Achim Becker's vision of pre-war Hamburg, the Störtebeker roundabout joins the setting of the large metropolitan roundabouts. To circle the Columbus Circle in New York, the Victory Column in Berlin or the Luxor Obelisk in Paris, you need time and concentration. Here in Hamm-Süd, it's all done very quickly. To base the design on the iconography of the world's metropolises may seem arrogant and snobbish. But what Achim Becker succeeds in is a good fusion of the periphery and the big city. The irritation in the play with space and time fuels the interplay of boredom and excitement on point. One begins to rethink the suburban character. The outer city can compete internationally. The representation of regional pride, which in rural regions is expressed in roundabout art, is here, however, the pride of a single man. Achim Becker wants to remind people of Störtebeker and perhaps also a little of himself.
At home, I run through the roundabout a few more times on Google Maps. Digital freaking out. Reality could have prosecuted me for that. There's a ban on 'useless driving back and forth', which theoretically means a fine for circling the artwork several times for pleasing viewing. I'm watching another image video by Achim Becker. It's called 'The Phoenix from the Ashes'. Where Süderstraße 259 is still being shot at by the Fraternité cannon, a new tower is soon to stand.
"With its modern glass facades, the building is reminiscent of New York or Dubai and is intended to show the people of Hamburg that Hamm is back. The four-storey high entrance will have palm trees and a fountain, creating an oasis in the middle of the revitalised district. Condominiums and penthouses are planned for the upper two floors, because the view of Hamburg and its waterways will be gigantic from up here. And for visitors and residents who are in a particular hurry, there will be a helipad on the roof of the building."
Okay Achim Becker – the sky is the limit. I guess we share my new motto in life. I keep on browsing. '22 million euros evaded: Prison sentences for coin dealers'.
Okay Achim Becker – the tax office is the limit. We have the same motivation; we are stopped by the same blockade. Achim Becker, a con man with a penchant for kitsch? A rich man because he collects money in a Störtebekeresque way or a do-gooder who wants to give away, as the founding philosophy in the Störtebekerhaus image film describes it. Perhaps he is many things, just like the architecture of his life's work. Multi-layered and decidedly assembled, screwed together, stolen together. A collector of historical layers of time and their relics, of money and views. I find the roundabout very emblematic of all this. Roundabouts keep the traffic moving and at the same time hold all possibilities. It can go on in any direction. Where I let myself be catapulted to, I alone decide. Drive wherever you want, but pay attention to the inner circle, don't disturb the blockade, look at it, adore it.
Here in the carousel of possibilities, Störtebeker is enthroned above Hamm and fights against too little urbanity.