Picture the Wirtschaftwunder!
by Herr MarkWorld Cup Hippo is excited to offer you the opportunity to win in our Picture the Wirtschaftswunder competition.
It’s easy to enter - all you need to do is have a think about the economic miracle that happened in Germany after the Second World War, and then render those ideas and feelings in a piece of artwork (no bigger than 3m x 2m). To get you started, Herr Hippo has created a collage after he spent an afternoon wallowing in dreams of the Wirtschaftswunder.
The competition is open to everyone, regardless of age or ability, and you can enter as many times as you like. Some of the best entries will be showcased below. To enter, just email your drawings to Wirtschaftswunder.competition@worldcuphippo.com.
Entries will be judged on how well they have created a striking depiction of the economic development of Germany after the war, and how they have made reference to the diverse cultural determinants of the economic miracle. The winner will be announced just before the World Cup finals begin in June. Herr Hippo’s decision is final. No correspondence will be entered into. And finally, some notes to inspire you…
- Wirtschaftswunder (in English, “economic miracle”) designates the upturn experienced in the West German economy after the Second World War. The expression was coined in 1950 by The Times in order to describe the economic miracle occurring in both Austria and Germany at that time.
- The West German Wirtschaftswunder was partly due to the economic aid provided by the United States and the Marshall Plan and through the currency reform of 1948, which replaced Reichsmark with the Deutsche Mark as legal tender.
- Apart from these factors, hard work and long hours at full capacity among the population and extra labour supplied by thousands of Gastarbeiter (”guest workers”) provided a vital base for the economic upturn. From the late 1950s onwards, West Germany had one of the strongest economies in the world, almost as strong as before the Second World War.
- Ludwig Erhard, who served as the Minister of the Economy in Adenauer’s cabinet from 1949 until 1963 and later became Chancellor, is often associated with the German Wirtschaftswunder.
March 27th, 2006 at 11:23 am
Can I use wax crayons?
March 27th, 2006 at 12:04 pm
Is it acceptable to approach this from a Marxist historical perspective?
March 27th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
Also what of the German Democratic Republic’s National Economic system? I think it’s system of centralised state macro level production planning would provide a great contrast - and it would look lovely in oils.
March 27th, 2006 at 12:19 pm
Hey Fouldsy! Are you for real?!! The GDR is better suited to the ‘painting with potatoes’ approach.
March 27th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
How can I email my papier-mâché construction? It does not fit in my 3 and a 1/2 inch floppy drive. Does anybody have a 5 incher they can slip my way?
March 28th, 2006 at 11:39 am
I think we can read much into the rise of Ostalgie (”eastern nostalgia”) and the development of a distinct eastern identity rooted in the experience of life in the GDR and the selection of the 2006 Germany squad.
Attachment to various customs and fixtures of everyday life of the GDR era takes many forms. The decision to change the signals at pedestrian crosswalks, for instance, prompted a tongue-in-cheek protest campaign throughout the east not long ago. Rather than words, pedestrian signals in Germany rely on silhouette figures, one standing and one striding, to indicate when it is safe to cross the street. The squat little man who had long presided over eastern street corners (Oliver Kahn?) briefly became a hero after authorities announced he was to be replaced with his leaner, more angular western rival (Jans Lehman?).
March 28th, 2006 at 12:23 pm
I would suggest a unique conceptual meta-comment on the spread of capitalism across the greater Germany through the 1990s and a celebration of the uniquely german single word concept of “schadenfreuden”. To wit: a time-based media representation of the fall of the wall and the development of a free market economy set against a satirical sideways-glance at steroetyping, invountary cultural ‘gag responses’ and the gift to the world that is the uniquely teutonic correlation between ‘multiple experiences’ and single word formations.
In other words a video of a fat bloke in leather shorts falling off a wall into a bucket of custard and money.
March 28th, 2006 at 12:24 pm
papier-mâché or potatoes. Either way, I don’t know how you can bring the all important Hoff-effect to life. David Hasselhoff is after all, credited with causing the spark that brought down the Berlin Wall and therefore unified the nation. Maybe we need a bronze of the famous shot of him with the puppies with a musical oom-pah rendition of ‘hooked on a feeling’ playing form speakers in the puppies. I’ll set to it.
March 28th, 2006 at 1:24 pm
I am thinking surely, we are not forgetting the music of electric pioneers Kraftwerk? I am mostly liking their unique brand of progressive pop, it is disco for the people yes? Potatos nein. Also I am very much thinking ‘Wind of Change’ by the Scorpions.
March 28th, 2006 at 2:10 pm
Thanks for your comments, and for all the pictures you’ve been sending in. There are some really very distinctive interpretations of the economic miracle coming to our attention. It seems we have opened up an area of economic history that has been under-represented by mainstream art.
So far, the best entry has been submitted by Herr Ed -
March 29th, 2006 at 11:26 am
I agree.
March 29th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
I like the Hasselhoff theme, but may I suggest the following. Perhaps a statue of Hasselhoff standing proud wrapped in the flag of the FDR with one fist raised and one cradling a microphone beckoning statues of GDR border guards towards him. In the background the pulsating rythmns of his greatist hit ‘Hot Shot City’ can blast out.
The piece seeks to reflect the brash confidence of one of the West’s greatest cultural icons; the irrepressible march of political and sexual freedom that he represents and the inevitable crumble of the GDR before it!
April 4th, 2006 at 10:02 am
When will the winner be announced?