From Brandenburg to Hollywood

INTERKULTUR at the “Golden Sport Pyramid” awards ceremony

“When she’s gliding on the ice”, Matthias Platzeck, premier of the German federal state of Brandenburg, says enthusiastically, “she tells stories. One time she’s graceful and gentle, another time she’s strong and full of passion.”

Millions of people all around the world might have felt the same. Katarina Witt, Olympic, World and European Champion in figure skating, enchanted a worldwide public by doing loop jumps, double axel jumps and pirouettes, not least as “Carmen on Ice”. It’s an advancement based on ambition, an iron will and severe discipline that ranges from Staaken and Karl-Marx-Stadt in the former GDR (now Chemnitz) up to Hollywood. The 44 year old was handed the “Golden Sport Pyramid” of “Stiftung Deutsche Sporthilfe” by Platzeck in Berlin. At the same time Witt, who has been committed to disabled children and youths with her own foundation since 2005, was inducted into the “German Sport Hall of Fame”. Thus, she’s one of five women in the phalanx of the “eternals”, next to idols like Franz Beckenbauer, Max Schmeling or Uwe Seeler.

INTERKULTUR was present in the Adlon hotel, when 300 invited guests celebrated Witt, among them politics, representatives of economy, culture and media, further active sportsmen as well as sport heroes from former times. INTERKULTUR ambassador Ralf Siepmann who represented the president and the curator of the “Sporthilfe” Günter Titsch: “A great career, an impressive person, indeed, an idol for young people who are electrified by the Olympic idea – whether as sportsmen or as singers and musicians.”

The circles of the famous figure skater and the Olympic ambitions of INTERKULTUR might intersect in the foreseeable future. Witt interacts as an ambassador for Munich’s bid for the Olympics in 2018. The worldwide connected organiser of the World Choir Games, the biggest universal choir competition, is committed to pave the way for encounters of young sportsmen and young choir singers at (Youth) Olympic Games and to build bridges between culture and sports, for example at the Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck in 2012.

The show with Kati Witt that captivated the TV audience in 2005 was named “Magic of winter”. Maybe it’s an omen for coming events?