With the VHS camera against the dictatorship

The topics addressed included free elections and their control, press censorship, the oppression of minorities, Nazis in the GDR, and the founding of the New Forum and other independent groups. It was a kind of "opposition television" that reached millions of GDR citizens via Western television. This was made possible by an East-West network across the border that contributed significantly to the end of the GDR, for example, through the worldwide distribution of footage of the Leipzig mass demonstration on October 9, 1989.


What drove these people, and how was it possible to maintain public awareness for years? How were they able to show things that the GDR government wanted no one to see, despite the Wall and the Stasi? Now, many of the impressive recordings can be seen, and participants talk about their creation.


Peter Wensierski, then an ARD television editor and himself a participant in this network, tracked down many people who dared to step in front of and behind the cameras. He interviewed them and rediscovered lost recordings.


Aram Radomski was part of the opposition television camera team from 1986 to 1989.


Uwe Schwabe, interviewee, shot footage of urban decay in Leipzig in the summer of 1989.



(IN GERMAN)