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From: Philipp Schorch, Daniel Habit (eds.) Curating (Post-)Socialist Environments April 2021, 344 p., pb., 76 b&w ill. 40,00 € (DE), 978-3-8376-5590-2 E-Book: PDF: 39,99 € (DE), ISBN 978-3-8394-5590-6 In which ways are environments (post-)socialist and how do they come about? How is the relationship between the built environment, memory, and debates on identity enacted? What are the spatial, material, visual, and aesthetic dimensions of these (post-) socialist enactments or interventions? And how do such (post-)socialist interventions in environments become (re)curated? By addressing these questions, this volume releases ›curation‹ from its usual museological framing and carries it into urban environments and private life-worlds, from predominantly state-sponsored institutional settings with often normative orientations into spheres of subjectification, social creativity, and ma- terial commemorative culture. Philipp Schorch is a professor of museum anthropology at Ludwig-Maximilians-Uni- versität in Munich, leading an ERC-project entitled »Indigeneities in the 21st Century«. He is also an honorary senior research associate at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge. His research focuses on museums, ma- terial culture/history/theory, contemporary art and (post)colonial histories, the Pacific and Europe, and collaborations with Indigenous artists/curators/scholars. Daniel Habit (Dr.) is a senior lecturer at the Institute for European Ethnology and Cul- tural Analysis at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universiät in Munich, where he received his PhD with a thesis on the concept of The European Capital of Culture programme of the European Union. His current research project in cooperation with the DFG funded research group »Urban Ethics« deals with diverse processes of transformation in Bu- charest from a urban and moral anthropology perspective. For further information: www.transcript-verlag.de/en/978-3-8376-5590-2 © 2021 transcript Verlag, Bielefeld Inhalt/Contents Acknowledgments | 9 Introduction The University of Leipzig as Curated (Post-)socialist Environment Philipp Schorch | 11 PART I: URBANITIES 1. Vergangenheit, was tun? (Gegen-)Erinnerungen, Musealisierungen und Moralisierungen im kuratorischen Umgang mit dem sozialistischen Erbe in Bukarest Daniel Habit | 31 2. Monuments and Memorial Spaces of Socialist Bulgaria Visual Transformations and Curatorial Challenges from a Post-socialist Stance Nikolai Vukov | 57 3. Curating Out the Socialist Alternative Art and Architecture in a Neoliberalized Leipzig April Eisman | 81 4. Kunstobjekte auf der Drehbühne der Geschichte Das Wandbild Der Weg der Roten Fahne (Dresden, 1969) zwischen sozialistischer Herrschaftsgeste und postsozialistischem Identifikationsobjekt Silke Wagler | 101 5. Re-curated Remains Exploring the Reconfiguration and Re-emergence of Two GDR Era Pieces of Art in Architecture in Contemporary University Media Martin Roggenbuck | 123 PART II: MUSEOLOGIES 6. Beyond Horseplay Leipzig’s Ethnographic Museum, Indian Hobbyists in the German Democratic Republic, and Experimental Ethnology as Popular Education Frank Usbeck | 141 7. (Re-)curating Africa Eine Analyse der Ausstellungsdisplays von 1949–1989 im GRASSI Museum für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig Stefanie Bach | 165 8. Curator’s Trade in Ideals Exhibitions, Exhibition History, and Networks of Artistic Solidarity in Cold War Times Beáta Hock | 185 9. Rehearsal for Lumumba Die Performativität von Erinnerungsorten und die Probe als künstlerische Methode der Aufarbeitung Carsten Saeger | 207 PART III: MATERIALS, VISUALS, PERFORMANCES 10. Aus Häusern und Containern Der Teppich als Nische privater Lebenswelten Simone Jansen | 237 11. Handgezeichnete Afrikakarten in ihrem Entstehungsumfeld der DDR Anna-Lisa Reith | 263 12. „Verstoßene Soldaten“ – verstoßene Helden? Kuratierung der Erinnerung an den antikommunistischen Widerstand durch die Rechte in Polen Agnieszka Balcerzak | 281 13. Curating Socialism? Curating Democracy! Die (Re-)Inszenierung der Zivilgesellschaft nach 1989 in Tschechien Marketa Spiritova | 309 Afterword Reflections on (Post-)socialist Curated Environments H. Glenn Penny | 331 Contributors to this Volume | 339 Acknowledgments This book is the outcome of a collaborative project carried out between 2017 and 2020. Firstly, we want to thank our colleagues at the Grassi Museum für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig and Leipzig University who supported the initiative but do not appear in the pages of this book, especially Ursula Rao. Secondly, we wish to acknowledge the fund- ing received from the SFB 1199, Processes of Spatialization under the Global Con- dition (Leipzig University), through the European Research Council Starting Grant No. 803302, Indigeneities in the 21. Century (Philipp Schorch), and by the “Schroubek Fonds Östliches Europa”, based at the Institute for European Ethnology and Cultural Analysis at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. Last but not least, we express our gratitude for the thorough editorial assistance provided by Ira Eue, Tomislav Hele brant and Philip Saunders; and for the rigorous comments on each chapter and the overall composition given by Irene Götz, editor of the transcript series on ‘Eth- nografische Perspektiven auf das östliche Europa’. In memory of Ada Hajdu (1978– 2020), whose article about the development of Romanian Art Historiography remains unfinished. Philipp Schorch and Daniel Habit, November 2020 Introduction Leipzig University as a Curated (Post-)socialist Environment Philipp Schorch In which ways are environments (post-)socialist and how do they come about? How is the relationship between the built environment, memory and debates on identi- ty enacted? What are the spatial, material, visual and aesthetic dimensions of these (post-)socialist enactments or interventions? And how do such (post-)socialist inter- ventions in environments become (re)curated? These key questions are addressed in Curating (Post-)socialist Environments. This volume locates the German Democratic Republic (GDR), or East Germany, in (post-)socialist Eastern Europe. ‘East’ or ‘Eastern’ have often been (ab)used and continue to be (ab)used as stereotypical labels to demarcate and hermetically seal the former ‘Socialist Bloc’ and its (post-)socialist heirs from ‘the West’ in Europe and be- yond. While being cautious of such homogenising markers and their alleged territorial confinements, it is reasonable to claim that ‘Eastern Europe’ serves as a valid regional point of reference with a common political and economic past manifested, for exam- ple, in socialist aesthetics, architecture and material culture (Wolff 1994; Schmale 2008: 23–35). This shared experience has led to similar tactics and practices of dealing and coping with the socialist past since the transformational events of 1989/1990. At the same time, however, there are significant regional and national differences, for instance, due to the incorporation of the former GDR as the neue Bundesländer (new states) into the Federal Republic of Germany. In addressing these histories and contemporary legacies, this book follows others who have approached post-socialist, post-communist or post-Soviet settings and transformations by including examples from East Germany (Sillince 1990; Ihle 2002; Czepczynski 2008; Kovács 2010; Bar- tetzky 2012; Haase et al. 2019: 105–124). The collection also follows others who have zoomed in on the specific case of the GDR and its predominant historisation and me- morialisation through West German frames of reference after 1989/90, in contrast to other Eastern European contexts in which post-socialist renegotiations have emerged and are contested through persisting yet evolving national systems (Offe 1997; Lin- denberger 2014: 29–42). Curating (Post-)socialist Environments opts for a fresh view on these concerns by exploring the multifaceted relationships between the built environment, identity is- 12 | Philipp Schorch sues and strategies of curating the socialist past through a (post-)socialist lens. It qual- ifies the ‘post’ in (post-)socialist, as the material and spatial focus presented here illu- minates the ongoing efficacy of socialist traces and presences in post-socialist times, thus, undermining the epochal hubris enshrined in clear-cut pre-/post-comparisons. Moreover, by pursuing ethnographically informed and interdisciplinary lines of enquiry, the book unsettles homogenising renditions of an idea such as ‘socialism’, which is often seen as a self-evident point of departure and self-enclosed totality, thereby revealing its heterogeneous qualities for particular individuals in specific lo- calities. The volume has grown out of a research project under the same title, which has brought together curators from the State Ethnographic Collections Saxony and the State Art Collections Dresden, East Germany, as well as academics and students in anthropology, art history and history from universities and research institutes in Germany, Bulgaria, Romania and the USA to collectively investigate (post-)socialist environments in East Germany and Eastern Europe through a curatorial lens. The ‘environment’, as defined here, encompasses material things, exhibitionary configurations, collections, households, architectural monuments and urban land- scapes; and ‘curation’ is understood in a broadened yet specific sense of attending to or taking care of material environments. Further specifying the overarching ques- tions listed above, the project has asked how curatorial interventions and the associ- ated