**Press photographer Eric Bachmann at a demonstration in Zurich in 1968. Photographer unknown.** Eric Bachmann Archiv

Eric Bachmann: the intrepid photographer and how he found fame

Photographer Eric Bachmann (1940-2019) shaped the perception of many events in recent Swiss history through his pictures and themes. One of his standout projects was his coverage of the 1968 Globus riots in Zurich and the unique way it combined informative value with aesthetic quality.

Manuel Walser

Manuel Walser is a historian and archaeologist. He works as a scientific project leader at the Cantonal Archaeology department Zurich.

Eric Bachmann was not even 30 years old when the slow-burning fuse lit by cultural tension in Zurich threatened to explode in 1968. The young Zurich native was working as a freelance photographer at the time, providing photographic material to various editorial offices and publishers. He had learned his trade during an internship at the photography studio of Hans Meiner, son of legendary photographer Johannes Meiner. On completing his apprenticeship, he found work at Swiss television broadcaster ‘Schweizer Fernsehen’, which was still a relatively young institution. However, he soon found that permanent employment did not satisfy his longing for freedom and adventure. He thus resigned and travelled to the Far East and Africa on reporting assignments. In 1966, he even joined Swiss adventurer Olivier Gonet as his photographer on his expedition vessel on a project researching the Red Sea and its fascinating underwater world. Another notable adventure was his trip to Czechoslovakia in 1966, his first time on the other side of the Iron Curtain. The following year, he also went to two other communist states, Yugoslavia and Albania. His visit to Cyprus, a hotbed of ethnic strife, marked his first foray into a conflict zone.

**Eric Bachmann on set at ‘Schweizer Fernsehen’. Photographer unknown.** Eric Bachmann Archiv

**An unusual destination for a Swiss person in 1967: communist Albania. Photograph by Eric Bachmann.** Eric Bachmann Archiv

While Bachmann travelled the world honing his eye for a good picture, social unrest was on the rise all over the world. The civil rights movement was gaining momentum in the US and resistance to the Vietnam war also continued to grow. In fact, opposition to the war extended far beyond the US and was most widespread in societies marked by the Second World War. Anti-war demonstrations in Japan, Germany and France led increasingly to violent confrontations with the police.

No-one at the time envisaged this social conflict spilling over into Switzerland. The Zurich police force were well aware of what was going on in the world but it didn’t occur to them that it could happen in Zurich. The few people who thought differently were simply ignored. An offer by a German manufacturer to supply water cannons to the Zurich police following the first student riots in Germany was rejected. A second offer after the Hallenstadion riots in spring 1968 also came to nothing. Nonetheless, the storm clouds were gathering over Zurich. Another causal factor behind the social tensions of the 1960s, which also applied to Switzerland, was a cultural paradigm shift towards pop music.

In 1965, the authorities delayed their response to a request for authorisation to hold a Rolling Stones concert. Then a request was submitted for a Kinks concert and a police officer wondered whether the resources required to ensure order at the event were justified in view of its “cultural insignificance”. Photo by Eric Bachmann. Eric Bachmann Archiv

Since the late 1950s, the western European media had been reporting on a “problem with the youth”, which referred to the alienation of the young through their copying of American consumer habits and growing individualisation. This was seen as a danger to society. In December 1965, the German Democratic Republic (GDR) decided to ban all imports of western beat music and concerts by western bands including any cover bands. Zurich, although more restrained, shared this disapproval of the burgeoning youth culture as evidenced by the actions of officialdom. For example, permission to stage concerts came with a caveat banning beat and blues bands from playing at local venues and supporters of the hard line taken by the police attempted to prevent the big beat bands playing concerts at larger venues, such as the Hallenstadion or Allmend. It was with good reason that a concert organiser complained to Blick newspaper in 1965 that the authorities had declared war on beat music: the head of Zurich's police department dealing with complaints about loud noise wrote in an internal report that it would be advisable, “to ban this Beatles music in all hostelries.” Most officials in Zurich saw pop culture as corruptive and dangerous. They even on occasion proceeded against youth clubs and pop-culture phenomena when they had no legal grounds for doing so, in the full knowledge that it would fan the flames of disenchantment among the youth. A high-ranking Zurich police officer forecast as early as 1963 that frustration among the young was “dangerously close to boiling point”.

**Eric Bachmann earned a reputation as a celebrity photographer. In 1965, John Lennon spent his winter holidays in St. Moritz and was snapped by Bachmann at Zurich airport.** Eric Bachmann Archiv

By the mid-1960s, Eric Bachmann’s portfolio included the full professional photographer’s repertoire. He also earned a reputation as a celebrity photographer in addition to his travel and reportage photos. He accompanied TV presenter Mäni Weber and singer Heidi Brühl behind the scenes at the ‘Schweizer Fernsehen’ studios; he also took photographs at recordings of the pop music programme Hits à Gogo. He proved remarkably adept at negotiating the grey area between the middle-class mainstream and youth pop culture. He was always in tune with the times and had his own way of documenting cultural upheaval. Bachmann also had his own cultural preferences photographing concerts by American jazz legends Count Basie, Erroll Garner and Ella Fitzgerald at the start of the decade, before moving on to the influential beat and rock bands The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix Experience and Small Faces. Furthermore, he took photographs of stars like John Lennon or Gina Lollobrigida for magazines, thereby extending their global fame into Switzerland’s living rooms. In 1968, he finally managed to capture the photographer’s holy grail: a photo for the ages.

**Expressions of solidarity with Rudi Dutschke and Benno Ohnesorg in spring 1968. In the background is the temporary Globus building by Bahnhofbrücke. Photo by Eric Bachmann.** Eric Bachmann Archiv

The watershed year of 1968 saw tensions come to a head in many places. An attack on left-wing activist Rudi Dutschke in the spring led to rioting in German cities. Students in Paris occupied the Sorbonne and there were pitched battles in the streets. Meanwhile, the situation was close to boiling over in Zurich, especially in 1967. After a Rolling Stones concert, the police came down hard on the 12,000-strong crowd in the Hallenstadion after concertgoers smashed up the folding chairs. Slightly over a month later, the city council decided to close all 34 official private music clubs. In response, the Zurich police assigned greater priority to the call, which predated the closure of the clubs, for an independent youth centre. A violent encounter with the police on the last May weekend of 1968 proved to be the straw that broke the camel’s back. Following the Jimi Hendrix Experience concert in the Hallenstadion, over 100 officers stormed the venue and batoned the crowd out onto the streets. This police brutality led to riots in which people were injured, there were also follow-up demonstrations. The demonstrators briefly occupied the vacant temporary Globus building and issued an ultimatum to the city council: a youth centre had to be provided by 1 July, otherwise the temporary Globus building would be reoccupied and turned into a cultural, social and activity centre. The city council turned down the ultimatum, which led to a showdown on 29 June 1968. The youth turned out to occupy the temporary Globus building. The police were ordered to stop them.

NZZ documentary of the spring revolt. Memories of May 1968 with Eric Bachmann (2018, in German). NZZ Format / YouTube

Eric Bachmann had just completed an assignment in Venice, and he returned to Zurich Main Station by train. As he alighted from the train, he heard the megaphones. He decided not to return home but to unpack his camera instead. He spent the whole night taking photographs, attracting some unwelcome police attention in the process. Nonetheless, he still managed some memorable shots, which would forever be linked to that fateful night. Some of his pictures even ended up on the front pages of newspapers and magazines. His most striking photo was taken on Bahnhofbrücke. It shows the two opposing sides facing each other: on one side are the defenders of law and order, on the other the rebellious youth.

The Zurich police cordoned off Bahnhofbrücke in the evening of 29 June 1968. Facing them were about 2,000 people demonstrating for an independent youth centre in the temporary Globus building. Eric Bachmann’s photo was coloured by hand by photographer Barbara Davatz about ten years later. Swiss National Museum / Eric Bachmann Archiv

The photo appeared shortly afterwards in the black-and-white ‘National-Zeitung’ broadsheet and socialist newspaper ‘Vorwärts’. Ten years later, Barbara Davatz applied the egg white coating (albumen), which gives the image its distinctive pop-art style, bringing it into line with the spirit of the sixties. That is how the iconic picture appeared in magazines, books and art exhibitions. As the whereabouts of the original print are unknown, a new print was commissioned for publication by the Eric Bachmann Fotoarchiv in 2024 and a copy added to the collection in the Swiss National Museum.

More of: 20th / 21st century Politics Society Culture Photography

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