Exhibition theme: Protest and Flight: Row of police at Plauen theater [13/56]
OBJECT INFORMATION
Info
October 7 1989
Plauen, Theaterplatz
Created By:
Martin FlachLicense:
From the Set
Demonstrators and a row of police in front of the theater in Plauen, Saxony (now known as "Theater Plauen-Zwickau"), where the first mass protest in the GDR that security forces were unable to dissolve took place. Protests were subsequently held there every Saturday until the first democratic elections took place on 18 March, 1990. 7 October is now commemorated in Plauen as the "Day of Democracy"
Depicts
banner (flag),
baton,
group of people,
helmet,
marcher,
member of the People's Police,
October 7, 1989,
pavement,
police cordon,
theatercelebration,
Christian Church,
city hall,
courage,
gun,
hope,
mayor,
No violence!,
rain,
reform,
resistance,
surveillance camera,
the Monday demonstrationsPeople/Organizations
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev,
Ministry for State Security,
People's PolicePlaces
Plauen Theater PlaceOther items in this set
Ultimately, it was the citizens of the GDR themselves who brought down the SED regime. From the summer of 1989 on, thousands of East Germans tried to flee to the West across the Hungarian-Austrian border and via the West German embassies in Budapest, Prague, and Warsaw. In East Germany itself, ever greater numbers of people supported the demands of the citizens' movements for free elections, freedom of the press, and freedom to travel, despite their fear of state repression. In October, mass protests, which now involved hundreds of thousands of demonstrators, spread across the entire country. Aware that their protest could no longer be stopped, people increasingly felt a desire to capture events on film.
Original Caption
"Riot police with batons by the theater"
(1 ranking) 
