Name/Title
Resetting German Clocks Forward to Moscow Time, May 1945Entry/Object ID
2021.30Description
Two soldiers on a ladder fixing the hands of a clock on the street in Germany. Both soldiers are in WWII military uniforms with guns strapped to their backs. A car with other soldiers waits in the street below.Context
The changing of clocks in Europe started in 1916 during World War I, when clocks starting in the German Empire but soon spreading across the globe were set forward by one hour to begin the world’s first daylight savings time. While initially short-lived, the practice was picked back up again during World War II, when Hitler’s commanders imposed the measure on many of their occupied countries, while Russia had abolished the practice in 1917. In Baltermants 1945 photograph, we see a Soviet soldier standing on a ladder, aided by his compatriot, as he changes the time on a clock in a German city with on-looking Soviet soldiers in the background. Though seemingly a mundane practice, the photograph symbolizes the Soviet occupation of the German town. An official photographer for the Kremlin, Baltermants documented scenes from the Soviet Union’s fight against Nazi Germany during World War II, or “the Great Patriotic War” as it was known in the then USSR.
Dmitri Baltermants was born in Warsaw when the city was still part of the Russian Empire. He earned his degree in mechanical mathematics from Moscow State University through the support of the Izvestia Printing House where he was hired as an apprentice printer. Baltermants taught himself photography during his studies at university and his photographs of the Polish invasion sparked his career as a leading photojournalist for the Red Army. He covered major World War II events in the early 1940s. Strictly instructed to cover feats of heroism and victory from the Soviet standpoint, Baltermants, a pacifist, kept the majority of his photographs secret until after the war, as they often depicted the harrowing effects of war, rather than the glorious and prideful versions of history requested from the government. From after the war until his death in 1990, Baltermants worked as a staff photojournalist for the illustrated magazine Ogonyok in Moscow.Acquisition
Accession
2021.29-49Source or Donor
Thomas WilsonAcquisition Method
GiftCredit Line
Gift of Thomas J. Wilson and Jill M. GarlingMade/Created
Artist
Baltermants, DmitriDate made
2003Lexicon
Nomenclature 4.0
Nomenclature Secondary Object Term
Print, PhotographicNomenclature Primary Object Term
PhotographNomenclature Sub-Class
Graphic DocumentsNomenclature Class
Documentary ObjectsNomenclature Category
Category 08: Communication ObjectsLOC Thesaurus for Graphic Materials
Street clocks, Soldiers, War