Im Objektiv der Staatsmacht - Fußballfans im Blick von Stasi und Volkspolizei

In the organizer's words:

Soccer stadiums in the GDR were places of sporting enthusiasm and provided a space for protest against the SED dictatorship. "40 meters square, minefield and barbed wire. Now you know where I live, I live in the zone" echoed from the stands in the 1980s.

Soccer fans were targeted by the security forces and turned from spectators into observers. Using covert methods - disguised as sports reporters or with a camera in their buttonhole - the state security service investigated inside and outside the stadiums and captured "suspicious" soccer supporters in photographs. The click of the shutter was often the beginning of political repression and prosecution.

The everyday lives of footballers who fled to the West, so-called "sports traitors", were also meticulously documented.

The open-air exhibition looks through the lenses of state power and reconstructs the world of the fans as well as the surveillance machinery of the SED state.

The exhibition will be open all day from September 13 to October 19, 2025 on the Rhine promenade in front of the museum.

The exhibition is bilingual (German/English).

Photo above: Photograph taken with a camouflaged camera: MfS agents working in conspiracy observe BFC Dynamo soccer fans in the mid-1980s in the vicinity of the Friedrich Ludwig Jahn Sports Park.