Bohley

Bohley managed to slip away, but some months later Stasi agents nabbed her and charged her with "treasonable passing of information" for talking to a Western journalist.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

Within three months of their greatest triumphs, Bohley and her friends were marginalized.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

In 1988, Bohley organized a protest at which people unfurled a banner at the annual state demonstration marking the 1919 murders of Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Leibknecht, founders of the German Communist Party.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

Bohley and her friends were socialists to the end; they were horrified that they might be the vehicle by which their fellow citizens gained access to Disney, McDonald's and Mercedes.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

But once the Wall came down, it was exactly that craving for the freedom to travel and consume -- to taste oranges and use soft toilet paper -- that rendered Bohley and New Forum irrelevant.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

On that icy dusk four years after the demise of the country that spied on her and imprisoned her, Bohley told me about her drive south to the Austrian-Italian border the summer after the Wall opened.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

But for nearly a decade before the Wall opened, Bohley had been chipping away at communist control of people's lives.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

In 1989, Bohley and a few friends pushed the dissident movement out of its church cocoon.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

Bohley was charged with "treasonable activity" and deported.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010

Publicly, Bohley never gave the impression that she savored her new freedom.

Remembering Baerbel Bohley, an artist who helped bring down the Berlin Wall Marc Fisher 2010