When you look at some of the old Soviet mosaics and the satellite countries paint work on buildings yoh can’t help but be impressed with the craftsmanship that went into it , I think it’s good that we still have these types of monuments parks , as we all realise especially with everyone on here , all of our countries have complicated pasts , personally I think Germany does extremely well in confronting theirs , others not so much . Whether we learn from it is a totally different question, 👍
Super piece, with so much to think about: curated memory, the changing meanings of monuments through time and regime change, pasts that refuse to be erased, despite the efforts of some to do so. I wish I’d seen this when I went to Berlin last year. I’ll have to add it to the growing list of things I’ve not yet experienced next time I visit!
I was one of those who said “wow”; it is a most extraordinary collection of memorials to Germany’s complicated history. Upon reflection it is though all the uncomfortable memories are put away in a box in a remote room in the house. It does make one think of the history associated with the statue; I found the decathlete particularly arresting as it brought sharply to mind the Nazi theories of racial superiority. Similarly the twin hagiographic statues of Red Army soldiers; idealised representations of a liberator/oppressor with an immensely complicated historical hinterland. The oddest object I thought was the extinguished DDR era eternal flame, removed from the Neue Wache and replaced by Käthe Kollwitz’s ‘Mother and her dead son’. The glass prism must have looked oddly incongruous in the classically designed building. Perhaps the saddest exhibit was the disembodied chest of Cant, absent his head. Kudos on capturing the sense of the exhibition Katja.
When you look at some of the old Soviet mosaics and the satellite countries paint work on buildings yoh can’t help but be impressed with the craftsmanship that went into it , I think it’s good that we still have these types of monuments parks , as we all realise especially with everyone on here , all of our countries have complicated pasts , personally I think Germany does extremely well in confronting theirs , others not so much . Whether we learn from it is a totally different question, 👍
Super piece, with so much to think about: curated memory, the changing meanings of monuments through time and regime change, pasts that refuse to be erased, despite the efforts of some to do so. I wish I’d seen this when I went to Berlin last year. I’ll have to add it to the growing list of things I’ve not yet experienced next time I visit!
I was one of those who said “wow”; it is a most extraordinary collection of memorials to Germany’s complicated history. Upon reflection it is though all the uncomfortable memories are put away in a box in a remote room in the house. It does make one think of the history associated with the statue; I found the decathlete particularly arresting as it brought sharply to mind the Nazi theories of racial superiority. Similarly the twin hagiographic statues of Red Army soldiers; idealised representations of a liberator/oppressor with an immensely complicated historical hinterland. The oddest object I thought was the extinguished DDR era eternal flame, removed from the Neue Wache and replaced by Käthe Kollwitz’s ‘Mother and her dead son’. The glass prism must have looked oddly incongruous in the classically designed building. Perhaps the saddest exhibit was the disembodied chest of Cant, absent his head. Kudos on capturing the sense of the exhibition Katja.