Zimzum Issue 1

issue 

n o . i 

Founder and Editor in chief 

Hadas Tapouchi 

Proofreader 

Frances Mossop 

Graphic Designer 

Ella Ponizovsky Bergelson 

A U T U M N 2 0 1 7 FREE 

CRIME SCENES IN EUROPE 

During WWII, an extremely complex network of forced labour was established 

in Germany and German-occupied Europe 

Hadas Tapouchi 

D 

uring WWII, an extremely 

complex network of forced 

labour was established in Germany and 

German-occupied Europe. The forced 

labourers and prisoners of war (POW) 

living in those camps were forced to 

work in a various industries. They 

produced goods for the German war 

effort and construction materials for 

the Reich and the occupied territories. 

These settlements would constitute the 

nerve centres of the “Thousand Year 

Reich”. In Berlin alone, there were 

3,000 sites that used forced labour, or 

in which forced labourers and POW 

were hosted or kept imprisoned. The 

characteristics of the forced labour 

industry during WWII bears all the 

hallmarks of a global network of forced 

labour. After WWII, most of the 

camps were destroyed, converted for 

different usage, or rebuilt. They 

became cafes, schools, galleries, 

institutional buildings, parks, 

museums, sport fields, or just open, 

abandoned surfaces. 

TODAY, THOSE PLACES 

HAVE BECOME CAFES, 

SCHOOLS, GALLERIES, 

INSTITUTIONAL 

BUILDINGS, PARKS, 

MUSEUMS, SPORT 

FIELDS, OR JUST 

OPEN, ABANDONED 

SURFACES. IN SOME 

CASES, THE LOCATIONS 

CONTINUE TO BE 

USED BY THE SAME 

COMPANIES THAT 

MADE USE OF THEM 

DURING THE WAR. 

Concentrations camps, as they 

developed after the outbreak of the 

war, would gradually become sources 

of slave labour for the German war 

machine. As the German forces began 

to retreat from the East in 1943, with 

the Allied successes in Northern 

Africa and Italy, a large pool of slave 

labour became essential in both 

production for the war effort and in 

maintaining agriculture, industry and 

services back in the German Reich. 

For the most part, slave labourers 

were ethnic Poles and Russian 

speakers. 

However, from 1943 onwards, the 

Germans began “reimporting” Jews 

from the ramps at death camps to 

work as slaves in the Reich. Joining the 

slave labourers from the east, there 

were hundreds of thousands of workers 

from the occupied Low Countries and 

France. Wartime emergency laws gave 

the authorities a perfect cover to 

maintain slave workforce. 

Lerchenfeld, a former Nazi built district home to the Hermann-Göring Mills, both of which were built by prisioners of war and forced labour workers. 

Photo: Hadas Tapouchi, Krems 2017 

A class system was created amongst 

Fremdarbeiter (“foreign workers”), 

starting with well-paid workers from 

Germany's allies or neutral countries, to 

forced labourers from conquered 

so-called Untermenschen (“subhumans”) 

populations. 

UNDER THESE 

CATEGORIES, 

A STATE (REGIME) CAN 

CONTROL ANY EXISTING 

HUMAN RIGHTS 

The list was organised into categories: 

a 

Guests Workers 

from the countries 

that were not allied with Germany 

a Military internees - prisoners of war 

b Civiliant workers 

c Eastern workers 

b 

Forced Workers 

c 

Being responsible or irresponsible 

regarding people’s rights while avoiding 

any compensation, it was a very 

profitable form of human trafficking; 

even more so than penal labour. One of 

the biggest examples in Berlin is the 

Autobahn network, realized during the 

second and the third phases (1938-1942 

and 1942-1945) by the Todt 

Organisation. 

The organisation was able to draw on 

“conscripted” labour from within 

Germany through the Reich Labour 

Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst, RAD). The 

submarine factories also resulted in a 

strong economy, producing a net of 

prisoners all over the Reich: Bremen, 

Hamburg, Kiel, even as far as Bergen 

(Norway) and Bordeaux (France). 

Through this method, the framework 

was activated systematically and 

sustainably; to recover from the 

catastrophe, the catastrophe became 

inherent to daily life, and the labour 

became a routine. 

Forced labour industry extended into 

various areas, such as the production of 

electrical components and weapon 

materials, e.g. V-2 rocket parts built for 

Siemens. 

THE 

IMPORTANCE 

OF ART 

PROJECTS 

FOR THE 

AWARENESS OF 

HISTORY 

Angeliki Douveri 

D 

uring prosperous times, as the 

‘80s and ‘90s were for Greece, 

regardless of whether it was real 

prosperity or a bubble that finally 

burst, history tends to be hidden as it 

cannot be a pleasant subject for 

anyone. Especially in Greece, history 

- and let’s just look at the 20th century 

- is a bloody and painful subject, 

involving oversimplified ideas of the 

“good” and the “bad”, which of course 

alternates depending on which side 

you’re standing. 

Is a work of art a real artwork until it 

is viewed by the public? Probably not. 

Does a personal testimony have any 

historical value until it is noted and 

published by historians? Definitely 

not. Can art help history overcome a 

national trauma? How does that work? 

Yes, it works as a tool for discussion, as 

an opportunity to bring the past into 

contemporary discourse, as a gentler 

way of sourcing the facts and all the 

detailed stories around them. It may 

also work as a way of therapy or 

catharsis once the pain has been dealt 

with. This makes the importance of art 

projects that approach history all the 

more important. 

History tends to be 

hidden, as it cannot be 

a pleasant subject for 

anyone 

Tapouchi’s “Transforming” project in 

the region of Rethymno, Crete, 

revealed a tremendous lack of 

historical documentation of facts that 

took place only a few decades back. It 

seems like the deeper the wound is, the 

bigger the silence. This may be a 

cultural choice of not passing on the 

trauma, of allowing the offspring to be 

happier. But history cannot be 

escaped. It runs in our blood, it forms 

our being, even if on a subconscious 

level. By not dealing with it, in reality 

we prolong the pain rather than avoid it. 

2 8

1 

One of the primary 

sources of inspiration for 

my initial photographic projects was 

Rainer Kubatzki’s book: Standorte und 

Topographie in Berlin und im 

brandenburgischen Umland 1939 bis 

1945 (2001). Subsequent to my 

reading the book, I collected 

documentations made in locations that 

were transformed into organic/ 

normalised parts of the urban 

landscape in Berlin. 

Along the process, I was examining 

other historical events that occurred 

during WWII. 

This examination allowed me to 

broaden the senses of crime scene, and 

to regard the concept of normalisation 

from different situations and events as 

massacres, executions, etc. 

The photograph seeks to unravel the 

scene, to untie the structure. 

IN KREMS, I COLLABORATED WITH 

DR ROBERT STREIBEL. MOST OF 

THE FINDINGS WERE BASED ON HIS 

PAST STUDIES. 

Transforming shows how memory is 

formative and is one of the primary 

practices for preserving normalisation. 

Memory teaches the subject in 

accordance with models of thinking 

and creating, and also with regard to 

what its visual reflection will look like: 

Positive, visible, monumental, 

victimising, free, decadent, etc. The 

memory connects the past and the 

future in a “systematic” way. It is a form 

of commemorating the past and 

designing the future. 

In a groundbreaking essay on the 

nature and power of memory from 

1989, Pierre Nora discusses the 

transience of memories, explaining how 

Memory is constantly 

on our lips because it no 

longer exists. 

reverberates in Michel Foucault’s 

influential theories of ironic “countermemory” 

and “effective” history with 

its moments of intensity, its lapses, its 

extended periods of feverish agitation, 

its fainting spells. Nora supports 

Foucault’s “counter memory” that 

becomes a milestone in modern 

western academies. 

Considering the brutality that Nora 

speaks about going through 

deconstruction, I am trying to evaluate 

what elements are necessary to produce 

normality. This debate was and is 

relevant in every culture, since it is a 

crucial means to rewrite history. 

Moreover, it may even work as a tool to 

substitute written history into another 

narrative that is more befitting the 

current political atmosphere. 

Nevertheless, Foucault’s approach 

introduces practices of remembering and 

forgetting in the context of power 

relations, focusing not only on what is 

remembered and forgotten, but also how 

it happens, by whom, and to what effect. 

THE THESIS 

DEVELOPED FROM 

A COMBINATION 

OF ARTISTIC AND 

HISTORIOGRAPHICAL 

RESEARCH 

CONDUCTED 

BETWEEN 

2013 AND 2017 

I plan to continue this research and 

create an archive of collective portraits. 

An archive in terms of visible forms of 

knowledge: a collection of images that 

intends to illustrate a plethora of things 

in a systematic or problematic way. 

The initial project began as 

photographic research, focused on the 

aesthetics of contemporary images of 

places used as forced labour camps 

during WWII. I have investigated 

campsites in Poland (as part of a CK 

ZAMEK residency in Poznan), Greece 

(ArtAmari residency in Crete) and, 

recently, with AIR Kunsthalle Krems, 

Austria. 

As an artist-in-residence, I was able to 

research and photograph drawing on 

local knowledge. This involved 

collaboration with historians, 

archivists, and local people and city 

planners. Usually, projects divide into 

three phases: 

a Research 

b Photography 

c Introducing the project to the public 

through exhibitions and artist talks 

In Crete, the situation was different, 

and the project was presented in the 

form of research and information in an 

academic context, as well as in the 

central archives and the local 

population. The overriding feeling was 

that there is neither sufficient curiosity, 

nor any concrete knowledge about any 

of the events that took place during 

WWII. Most of my knowledge was 

gained through meeting people in their 

natural environment and by listening 

to their own subjective experiences. 

THE ARCHIVE 

CONTAINS 

1.000 IMAGES FROM 

FOUR DIFFERENT 

COUNTRIES 

Stela, testimony of Gerakari massacre, Crete, 

Greece. Photo: Hadas Tapouchi, 2016 

The research will provide a theoretical 

frame for the work that I have carried 

out to this date. It will present a theory 

that aims to shed light on a 

normalisation process in which images 

are deconstructed and reconstructed 

over many years. The focus of this 

project has gradually broadened from 

an interest in a specific historical 

dimension to a preoccupation with the 

subject of archiving and storing - how 

we “write” and accumulate our 

histories and memories, both as 

individuals and as a culture. 

Additionally, one is 

inevitably confronted with 

obsessions, particularly in 

Continental Europe, with a 

dialectic mechanism of 

memory and of loss. The 

archive contains 1000 images 

from four different countries, 

while each one exposes many 

layers of the city or landscape 

that were mostly hidden or 

unknown to its inhabitants, 

and the revelation itself 

attracted significant public 

interest. It reveals as well the 

many competing narratives 

that emerge after a conflict. 

However, it also specifically 

contextualises these new 

experiences in a colossal 

historically unique system in 

which all “others” were 

victims. 

Screen shot: Mapping Krems 

AS PART OF AN ARTIST-IN- 

RESIDENCE PROGRAMME IN THE 

WINTER OF 2016, I WAS ABLE TO 

EXTEND MY WORK TO THE CITY 

OF POZNAN, POLAND (FORMERLY 

POSEN). 

The image was taken in Poznan, Poland during the CK ZAMEK artist residency 

in Poznan. The exhibition stretched over dozens of public spaces around the city, 

for example, in bus stations, trams and on billboards. 

Screen shot from a video documentation: Hadas Tapouchi, Poznan 2016 

Phenomenon memory 

The phenomenon of complicity 

branched all over Europe, as it took 

place in several locations and was an 

enormous exchange network of humans 

and goods - normalisation happened 

everywhere. Significantly, this is why a 

“transforming project” could be used in 

any post-conflict situation. As I 

demonstrated in the case studies above, 

memory is a global concept and the 

research represents the official narrative 

clash, as it encourages facing new 

narratives and new memories. Through 

understanding the power of narrative 

visibility, I am creating an aesthetic 

theory. 

The challenge of visualising 

“disciplinary power” in art 

Throughout this research, I demonstrate 

the tense intertwining of disciplinary 

power and everyday life, and how it is 

perceived as an obvious situation. Power 

strives to be understood as something 

unreachable; by means of its very 

banality, it assumes a double character 

of being overexposed and invisible/ 

hidden at the same time; it operates 

according to its own unfathomable but 

unquestioned (by entire societies) rules. 

The research deals with the problem 

of two major issues: Firstly, the city 

(and landscape) as the manifestation 

of normalisation. Secondly, the city’s 

generally hidden and unspoken 

codes that regulate the order 

imposed on, and derived from, the 

city. 

Michel Foucault’s publication 

Discipline and Punish (1975) deals 

with control and normalisation as a 

combination of strategies to practice 

maximum social control with 

minimum use of force, including 

the way in which normalisation 

constructs idealised human 

behavior. This is analogous to the 

process of change as discussed by 

Foucault: 

The man described 

for us, whom we are 

invited to free, 

is already in himself 

the effect of a subjection 

much more profound 

than himself 

The equilibrium between the present 

and past is disturbed because the 

discontinuity creates very different 

narratives. Memory has couple of ways 

of being treated: personal or collective; 

and it is activated freely through 

nostalgia, similarity, and metaphor. 

Memory for Nora is a paradigm 

suffused into contemporary culture. 

The establishment of worship as 

cultural initiation, memorial buildings, 

flags, anthems and memoir writings are 

a single phenomenon. The discussion 

concerns historic preservation as a 

phenomenon of a strong sense and 

cultural identity. Pierre Nora writes: 

Memory takes root 

in the concrete, in 

spaces, gestures, images, 

and objects: history 

binds itself strictly to 

temporal continuities, 

to progressions and to 

relations between things. 

The linguist James E. Young has looked 

at the modern concretisation and 

aestheticisation of memory and 

national narratives in relation to 

Germany in his publication The 

Texture of Memory. In the work, he 

touches upon the consequences of these 

first prototypes that emerged as dozens 

of “counter memorial” projects became 

the standard for subsequent Holocaust 

memorial competitions in Germany. 

Young discusses the work by German 

artist Horst Hoheisel, who constructed 

a huge fountain to commemorate a 

similar fountain donated to the city of 

Kassel by a local Jewish entrepreneur, 

Sigmund Aschrott, in 1908. The Nazis 

destroyed this fountain, and Hoheisel 

buried his version of the fountain 

beneath the ground. And as in the case 

of the fountain, Pierre Nora warned in 

his book Between Memory and 

History: 

The less memory is 

experienced from the 

inside, the more it exists 

through its exterior 

scaffolding and outward 

signs 

In his work, Hoheisel solved the 

problem by streaming the water flow 

towards the ground. Hoheisel had 

already been known for his negativeform 

monument in Kassel, a simple but 

provocative anti-solution memorial 

proposed in the contest: an antimemory 

sculpture, which illustrates 

that to not have a memory, or to not 

remember, is to shatter the object. 

Hoheisel’s submission for the 

Holocaust memorial competition in 

Berlin was even more radical. He 

suggested demolishing the 

Brandenburg Gate, burying and 

dissolving all the remains over its 

former site, and finally covering the 

entire memorial area with granite 

plates. The memory’s history critique 

Methodological photography 

The photographs are typological, warm, 

inviting, and even discreet. Thus, they 

stand in contrast to the shocking and 

ghoulish images known from that 

period, and which are being used to 

this day to describe history in a one 

dimensional narrative, an untouched 

narrative. Everyday life is underlined 

through the use of colour photography 

and the occasional inclusion of 

pedestrians, who sometimes may 

even look at the camera. History 

stands at the centre of the research, 

not as an abstract goal in itself, but 

rather as an instrument to understand 

contemporary reality. 

The photographic medium I am 

using in order to visualise historical 

data is the medium format colour 

film. It enables me to gain hyperrealistic 

images. The idea behind it is 

to empower and emphasise my topic: 

normalisation. The use of hyperrealistic 

images is intended to stress 

the reason for speaking necessarily 

about the present, then the past. The 

past is inherent in the image/reality, 

and there is no need to highlight it 

more than it already is. Normalisation 

and memory are types of power that 

are free from any law. They constitute 

power in the sense that people do not 

need any authority to control them. 

This power is no longer imposed from 

above through outright coercion, 

but by disciplining people to serve 

power themselves. Not only prisons, 

also urban and landscape aesthetics 

such as nature, hospitals, schools, and 

museums are the only physical and 

visible evidence that demonstrate a link 

to any architectural form. 

Public meets Art 

The objective of photographing and 

thus documenting is to encourage 

observers to integrate their own 

historical knowledge into an everydayorientated 

perspective and sensitise 

them to the process of normalisation, 

where experiences of violence are 

hidden or ignored and eventually 

re-absorbed. In my research, I use 

images as site-specific installations, 

reflective of the historical occurrence, 

culture and memory. I want to bring 

this to light through various modes of 

representation, neutralised in everyday 

life. The site-specific works installed in 

the public sphere - bus stations, 

billboards, newspapers - do not 

interrupt, or draw attention to, the 

relevance of daily life. Much of my 

knowledge was acquired within 

residencies, conferences and artist talks 

that I held, and situations in which I 

had the opportunity to interview 

people from different fields, as well as 

reading and listening to memoirs. 

How art meets the public: how can the 

artistic, theoretical materials enter the 

public, make it visual and, by doing so, 

make it real, substantial. The public 

performance is to ask the community 

to observe the obvious, to re-think and 

re-ask what part they play in the public 

sphere, what their role is in the 

representation of collective memory. 

Hadas Tapouchi is a visual artist, 

founder and editor of Zimzum 

newspaper. She is based in Berlin.

3 

AIR 

KREMS 

AUSTRIA 

Last July/August, I was invited to be an artist-inresidence 

at Krems. During these months, I examined 

my practice along the Danube and in the lush 

vineyards, photographing the sites based on data I 

achived during my stay. The purpose of the newpaper 

is to expand the concept of normalisation; to examine 

how it functions in different areas. I asked twelve 

colleagues I got to know during the previous and 

current study to write about what normalisation is for 

them and how it functions in their field. 

Stalag XVII B Krems - Gneixendorf. The biggest camp for 

POW in Austria where 70,000 prisoners were held. 


IG gallery 

T 

he images in the exhibition are 

a continuation of my memory 

practice. My works are being shown 

in vitrine tables, in an attempt to 

present the images within the 

language of the world of findings and 

discoveries. 

In the video work Landschaft 

(Landscape), I made in Krems, my 

aim is to examine the landscape as a 

site of amnesia and erasure. It is a 

strategic site for burying the past and 

masking history through natural 

beauty. Adorno writs: 

Print screen from the video Landschaft. 

Video: Hadas Tapouchi, Krems 2017 

Beauty in nature 

is the history 

that stands still 

and refuses to be 

revealed 

In this context, I used the creation as 

an extention of the concept of 

erasure-recreation. It is an abstraction 

of space and an illustration of space, 

reductionism to what appears from a 

distant perspective, a vantage point 

that controls, frames and focuses the 

landscape in terms of such well 

known epithets as pre-poetic, 

picturesque, lofty, pastoral, etc. 

During the process, I referred to the 

text by Professor William John 

Thomas Mitchell, an iconologist: 

What do pictures want (2005)? 

He quotes the term "totemism" from 

Claude Lévi-Strauss, “defining 

relations of ideological status 

between two series, one natural and 

the other cultural.” Is that not the 

definition of landscape? 

The title was the result of my 

researching the etymology of the suffix 

“-schaft”, which can be traced to the 

Indo-Germanic root * skapi / * skapja / 

* skafti, derived from the verb 

"scapjan", which means “create”. 

THE LANDSCAPE WAS 

MEANT TO BE LOOKED 

AT, NOT TOUCHED. 

The totem, like the landscape, is an 

ideological instrument by which 

cultures give themselves the status of 

nature, planting themselves in the 

earth, or a symbolic space in which 

communities have a common destiny. 

Artothek Niederösterreich. In a company named Gustloff- 

Werke POW´s re-filled cartridges (firearms) after 1940. 


A R T 

I S T 

T A L 

K S 

Artist talk #1 

City Hall, Stein 

Rathausplatz 2, Stein 

Monday, October 2nd 2017 at 6pm 

Panel with Dr. Robert Streibel and Hadas Tapouchi. 

Moderator: Andreas Hoffer 

Artist talk #2 

IG gallery 

Gumpendorfer Str. 10-12, Vienna 

Wednesday, October 4th 2017 at 7pm 

Panel with artists: 

Iris Andraschek, Hubert Lobnig and Hadas Tapouchi. 

Moderator: Ruth weismann

H 

ow can you live here with all 

this knowledge? asks a visitor 

to the town. All these stories about its 

inhabitants. Here a mass grave, there 

dead corpses, a hangman's space, a 

blood smeared shop window, the owner 

of the electrical shop arrested and forced 

to sell up, and a 22-year-old shot on the 

parish square directly in front of the 

church in February 1945. 

Not to mention the place on the country 

road, where, in the late 1990s, the doctor 

was still bellowing about the “Jewish pig” 

whose daughter had sold the house too 

expensively. 200 meters away is the 

Sappeur monument to the fallen of the 

First World War. It was here that the last 

commemoration of Adolf Hitler took 

place on the 6 May 1945. And, in the 

1980s, neo-Nazis stopped here for their 

Flag Day parade. Within sight is the 

only monument to a general of the 

German Wehrmacht, Karl Eibl. Erected 

in 1959. When the monument was 

moved here to the Südtyrolerplatz in the 

1970s, the Red Army obelisk had already 

disappeared a second time, and the 

1,600 dead Russian prisoners of the 

STALAG 17B camp had been exhumed 

for a second time. 

The Franz Zellerplatz was named after a 

beheaded resistance fighter, and if it had 

not been for the false window bearing 

the inscription “It is difficult to put the 

head under the guillotine”, nothing 

would remind us of who Franz Zeller 

really was, and some would think the 

place bears the name of an operetta 

composer. From here, you can also see 

the house where the 22-year-old deserter 

Richard Ott hid. His school friends 

called the police three times to demand 

his arrest. 

On April 2, the area around the station 

lay in debris after being bombed by 

American aircraft. About 300 civilians 

were killed. And on 6 April 1945, the 

dead lay in the streets in front of the 

penitentiary. And the dead, for whom 

no place in the mass graves can be 

found, are thrown into the Danube 

where the landing stage now stands. 

WERE THE PEOPLE OF 

KREMS PARTICULARLY 

“EVIL”? 

How can one live here? But the past 

has something comforting. Everything 

has passed, the tears have dried - if 

there ever were any. And the 

opposites were clear enough. There 

the victims, and there the 

perpetrators, and, in between, those 

who had watched, those who had 

looked away, and some who had also 

helped. Were there many who had 

this courage? Whoever wants to tell 

history with statistics, and believes to 

be able to decide upon good and evil 

will have a hard time. The 99% for 

Adolf Hitler are not the whole truth. 

But what is the truth? Were the 

people of Krems more fanatical than 

the inhabitants of other small towns? 

Was anti-Semitism more pronounced 

here? Why, nevertheless, was the 

resistance not so insignificant in this 

place? 

The Arian paragraph was used for the 

first time in the Wachau at a gym 

festival in the 19th century. A bomb 

explosion was the decisive factor that 

led to the banning, in 1933, of the 

NSDAP in Austria. Within a few 

months, there were explosions in 

several places, for example, in front of 

the parish church in Stein, and in front 

of the „Englischen Fräulein“ school. 

From Krems, Gauleiter Josef Leopold 

conducted, Austria wide, the illegal 

NSDAP. And in Krems, the November 

pogrom had already taken place in 

September 1938. Jews and those 

thought to be Jews were forced to 

vacate the temple. 

Are these facts sufficient for a finding? 

Lack of numbers govern feelings. 

Consolatory past? But what is the 

difference between the victims and the 

perpetrators and those who are not; 

those who helped? 

PERSIL COUPONS AND 

THE LARGE WASHING 

PROCESS 

Historical research 

is not a game of 

shadows featuring 

only black and 

white. And the 

sweeping accusation 

that “one” did not 

question the past 

after 1945 is 

difficult to uphold. 

All well and good. 

In the summer of 

1945, Leopold Figl 

had already believed 

that a line should 

be drawn. The 

debate was over 

before it had even 

begun. National 

socialists were 

recorded in lists 

and there were 

people's courts. In 

exactly 136,829 

cases, preliminary 

investigations were 

initiated on 

suspicion of 

national socialist 

crimes or 

“illegality”. The 

abundance of cases 

allowed for very 

rapid judgements in 

which the 

perpetrators were 

sentenced according 

to formal offences 

- regardless of what 

they had done. 

Members of the 

Order of Blood, 

illegal NSDAP 

party members. 

Daily parallel cases, 

senates verses 

former Nazis. Was 

there always time to 

look for the truth? 

Were there any 

possibilities for the 

victory of justice? 

Those who had 

been branded as a 

Nazi still had the 

possibility of 

showing a “Persil voucher”. The big 

white wash began. Many defendants 

were often able to name one, two, three 

or more people who said the person 

concerned was decent, that he had 

helped, and so on. A nation of 

resistance fighters? 

How much truth was there in this 

white washing process? The most 

striking instance is probably the story 

of a Jewish woman in Krems, who, 

thanks to her “Aryan” husband, 

survived the war because he had refused 

to allow her to divorce him. Shortly 

after the liberation, total strangers came 

to her apartment for confirmation that 

they had not betrayed her, had not 

denounced her. Everyone had a Jewess, 

a resistance fighter, a non-Nazi whom 

they had helped. 

In the case of illegal Turkish dual 

citizens, case-by-case trials are an 

elaborate procedure. The results of 

historical research in 2017 are often as 

uncertain as ever concerning the one 

who has adopted the shadow game. 

A country cannot be improved with 

court cases. Justice does not mean 

re-education at the same time. 

Condemnation does not guarantee 

change of attitude. The understanding 

of what has happened does not occur 

with condemnation. Usually, the 

convicted person feels unjustly treated 

and the families see themselves as 

victims. To examine this would be an 

exciting field. Not to provide the 

perpetrators with the sacredness of new 

“sacrifices”, but to provide an 

understanding of the times and the 

options for politicians after 1945 would 

be an option. And, to question how a 

country can be so convinced of Nazi 

crimes. 

History is not a game of shadows. But 

some people simply want to stretch 

everything. As Oskar Helmer, Minister 

of the Interior put it, the money for 

lawyers and nerves has first to be raised 

so as to be able to fight for ten years for 

the return of aryanised property. Ten 

years are not unusual. 

HISTORY 

IS NO GAME 

OF SHADOWS 

Thoughts on dealing with the Nazi past 

in Krems and elsewhere 

As of the summer of 1945, the demand 

for the drawing of the line was put, 

but, all the same, there were the 

occupying powers. This anti-fascism by 

decree was anything but sustainable. 

There was a commemoration of 

victims, but in a language and under 

political pre-decision that sometimes 

robbed this undertaking of its honesty. 

The victims of the massacre in Stein 

were remembered in the period 

between 1945 and 1955. After which, 

the victims' associations had to organise 

their own commemorations away from 

public view. According to the state 

treaty in “free” Austria in 1955, the 

fallen soldiers, sometimes also called 

heroes, appeared once again on the 

agenda. The time for heroic 

commemoration and fast forgetting. 

We were all victims. And suddenly 

neither the perpetrators' nor the 

victims' names had ever been 

anonymous, and those who had helped 

were glad of not being discovered. 

By the very latest in 1948, the SPÖ and 

the ÖVP began wooing the former. 

Faber was publishing local newspapers 

again. The old spirit occasionally 

celebrated, and, in 1963, Herbert 

Faber, the chairman of the comrades' 

club, demanded the boycott of a 

celebration in which priests who were 

murdered in concentration camps were 

to be honoured. The coercion towards 

Realpolitik in the seventies made 

history appear in a different light. 

Thus, the “Nestor” of the newspaper 

system is personally honoured in Krems 

on the occasion of his 80th birthday by 

Federal Chancellor Bruno Kreisky. 

History is not a game of shadows. 

Robert Streibel 

Translation Nigel A. James 

EXAMPLE KREMS 

AFTER 1945: 

WE WERE ALL 

VICTIMS 

In this process of fast forgetting, Krems 

plays a pioneering role. Between 1955 

and 1969, the integration of people 

formerly charged with political crimes 

is successfully practiced under Mayor 

Franz Wilhelm. The magic word 

means an electoral community, and 

some cities look enviously towards 

Krems. No wonder that the first 

reunion of the Stalingrad fighters took 

place in Krems in 1959. The mayor 

Franz Wilhelm appears as the main 

speaker at the comrades' reunion and 

engages in striking words for the 

former soldiers. 

Franz Wilhelm is a proud member of 

the German Athletic Association. At 

the honouring ceremony of his 30 year 

membership, he praises the high ideals 

of the association and says that the 

avowal to the great German cultural 

community was something that should 

never be denied. In this context, it is 

also fitting to say that Franz Wilhelm 

was the only Austrian mayor who 

protested against the arrest of the 

so-called late home comers. On 31 

May 1956, the “Kremser Zeitung” 

reported that the Ministry of Justice 

had announced that 15 late home 

comers from Russian captivity had 

been arrested. They had been accused 

of taking part in shootings during the 

war in Poland, either as policemen or 

military personnel. In 1946, these 15 

persons were arrested and handed over 

to the Russians. After more than nine 

years of imprisonment in Russian 

prisons, an Austrian Minister of Justice 

reserved his right to put the 15 former 

police officers in jail again. Franz 

Wilhelm, in his telegram to Justice 

Minister Dr Hans Kapfer states: 

On the basis 

of a myriad 

of demands 

and clues, I 

consider it my 

duty to draw 

your attention 

to the fact that 

the population 

feels great 

indignation 

and contempt 

towards a 

judiciary 

which finds 

against late 

home comers 

for alleged 

crimes, which, 

can be said, 

have already 

been punished 

by the many 

years of 

incarceration 

in Russian 

prisons. These 

men, having 

recently 

arrived home, 

had been 

looking to 

freedom. I 

do not wish 

to conceal 

from you 

the fact that 

the chosen date has a 

very bad taste, as if the 

time of the liberation 

was a choice of tactical 

deliberation. Would 

you please also take note 

of the fact that certain 

new so-called “war 

crimes”, which having 

been directed by hate 

and revenge instincts of 

the first post-war years, 

are now also regarded as 

very problematic on an 

international scale and 

contradict the venerable 

tradition of Austrian law 

based on the old- Nulla 

poena sine lege. 

What is said in Latin gets meaningfully 

translated, the sentence of the telegram 

means nothing other than that an act 

can only be punished if the criminality 

was determined by law before the act 

was committed. When jurists once 

concluded that Jews are not human 

beings, their murder was right and 

could never be punished. 

When, in 1956, Austrian recruits 

repossessed the barracks in Krems and 

Mautern, Mayor Wilhelm, in his 

speech as historian, points out that, 

since the time of Maria Theresia, Krems 

has always been a garrison town. And 

the soldiers of the city have a wonderful 

character. “Home love, honour, loyalty, 

courage and steadfastness, devotion to 

the community, and idealism! Our time 

needs these ideals again.” 

The recollection of the National 

Socialism time was a slanting plane. 

Everything was sliding. There were 

only victims. Therefore, from the 

official side, it should not have been 

necessary to remember only the 

genuine victims. When a declaration 

of the mayor was read out in the 

council in March 1962, Franz Wilhelm 

was not present. Wilhelm is ready to 

“remember” without mentioning the 

words “national socialism”. This is a 

performance and makes it clear that it 

was merely a formal act. The big white 

wash with a new turbocharger. “Today, 

exactly 24 years ago, German troops 

invaded Austria. The invasion of these 

troops was neither in accordance with 

the Austrian government, nor with the 

Austrian people. The name Austria was 

extinguished. Today, we want to 

commemorate all those who died in the 

Second World War, all those who were 

buried under the bombs, those who 

died in the concentration camps, or 

those who were executed as upright 

Austrians.” 

In 1945, Krems showed how to deal 

with the past and understood how all 

can suddenly become victims. With 

this attitude, Krems found itself in 

“good” company, but the “electoral 

community” was only us. 

It took a long time for the perpetrators 

and victims to get a name and a face, 

and this process has not yet been fully 

completed. Mayor Erich Grabner 

(ÖVP) spoke in 1988 at the book 

presentation of "And, Suddenly They 

Were Gone. The Jews of the Gau 

Capital Krems and Their Fellow 

Citizens”. Mayor Erich Grabner said 

that the flap text of the book states that 

Krems is a Nazi town - which hurts me. 

During the interval, the uncertainty 

seemed to paint question marks on the 

faces of the listeners. The surprise came 

in the form of an afterword. 

Unfortunately, the author is right. An 

open word. And an entry ticket to the 

Krems Society for critical history. 

The first signs were set. The monument 

in the Jewish cemetery - The Threshold 

of Forgetting by Hans Kupelwieser. 

Nidetzky and Partners, tax advisers, 

open their office in Krems in 

Schwedengasse with an exhibition 

about the author of a book on Anna 

Lambert's Jewish family. Often, “only” 

the information is needed. Afterwards, 

Gerhard Nideztky commissioned a 

work of art, "In this city" by artist Leo 

Zogmayer. Anti-Semitism and racial 

hatred are so deeply entrenched that 

counter-measures must be taken at the 

roots of society. A petition against 

anti-Semitism and racial hatred and 

signed by more than 400 citizens has 

been permanently placed in the 

foundations of the city's landmark. An 

unprecedented private initiative. The 

“History Happens” initiative, in 

cooperation with students of the BRG 

school, takes place without the support 

of the city. But, despite this, 

information boards relating the history 

of the Jewish population have been 

installed at 20 sites in business 

locations and residential buildings. 

In 2014, the city of Krems, under 

mayor Reinhard Resch, took over the 

organising of the commemorations for 

the victims of Stein. Following the 

author's suggestion, a small alley was 

named named after Gerasimos 

Garnelis, a Greek resistance fighter who 

survived the massacre. (The descriptive 

panel is still missing today!) In 2016, 

the city launched a competition for 

pupils specialising in contemporary 

history. In November 2016, at the 

suggestion of the author, a memorial 

commemorating the synagogue 

destroyed in 1978 was erected. This was 

based on the concept implemented by 

Hans Kupelwieser in Hietzing, Vienna 

in 2004. A reminder with a drop of 

vermouth, more than that, it is a bitter 

goblet. It is more important for Ernst 

Kalt and Josef Wagner to perpetuate 

their own name, whilst the Jew from 

Krems who took the photograph in 

1974 appears merely as A. Nemschitz. 

Perhaps, Abraham Nemschitz is too 

much for the city? Let us also see this 

in a positive way. Much has been 

achieved. In the meantime, memorial 

work has also become a way of 

satisfying personal vanities. Who 

would have thought of this in the 80s, 

when only 12 people turned up for the 

first commemoration of the November 

1938 pogrom of the synagogue in 

Krems. A social democrat, a 

communist, a district court president, 

an historian, monastic nurses, teachers, 

and a VHS director. To experience 

justice, a long breath is needed. 

A memorial for the victims of the 

resistance, for the murdered deserters, 

and Richard Ott who was shot dead in 

the middle of the city is still missing. 

And history has not yet reached the 

town's wine museum. But it won't be 

long in coming! 

Robert Streibel, historian, author and 

director of VHS Hietzing in Vienna; 

involved in different activities dealing 

with history and commemoration.

5 

THIS IS EBENSEE, 

LOOKING NORTH 

TOWARDS LAKE TRAUNSEE 

ON TRANSFORMATION 

A letter 

Christoph Szalay 

D 

I want to tell you a story 

about the time leaves fell 

from the trees all at once. I 

am thinking of cataclysm. 

More than anything, I 

want to tell you this. I 

want to disappear in the 

night. I want the night to 

vanish from memory. 

I want to tell you how this 

happened. 

Paul Guest 

DON'T ASK ME 

HOW THIS CAME 

TO BE. 

MAYBE BECAUSE 

IT LEAVES 

ENOUGH SPACE 

FOR WANDERING 

THROUGH PAGES 

AND PICTURES 

WITHOUT THE 

DEMAND OF 

ANALYTICAL 

NOTATION AND 

SEQUENCING. 

MAYBE BECAUSE I 

NEEDED SOMEONE 

TO TALK TO OR 

AT LEAST THE 

ILLUSION, THE 

FANTASY OF IT. 

MAYBE BECAUSE I 

JUST DON'T KNOW 

ANY BETTER. 

YOU ASK ABOUT 

TRANSFORMATION 

IN YOUR WORK, 

THE PROCESS OF 

URBAN, 

SOCIAL 


AND THE MANNER 

IN WHICH 

WHEN I GO ON 

YOUR WEBSITE, 

I FIND PICTURES 

OF STORAGE 

BUILDINGS, 

GALLERIES, 

ABANDONED 

FACTORIES, 

FAMILY HOMES, 

ETC. IN VARIOUS 

EUROPEAN CITIES 

AND LANDSCAPES. 

A LETTER 

STRUCTURED 

SOMEHOW LIKE 

A POEM. 

ALL OF THEM 

FORMER LABOUR 

CAMPS DURING 

THE NAZI REGIME. 

I LIKE THE 

IDEA BEHIND 


BECAUSE IT SPEAKS 

OF MOVEMENT AND 

STORYTELLING. 

TWO TERMS 

THAT SEEM TO BE 

CENTRAL FOR A 

CONTEMPORARY 

DISCOURSE ON 

THE SHOAH AND 

BEYOND, THE 

SITES AND STORIES 

OF NAZI TERROR 

BEGINNING WITH 

THE BUILDING 

OF THE FIRST 

CONCENTRATION 

CAMPS IN 

DACHAU AND 

ORANIENBURG IN 

1933. 

“I LIKE” IS 

MAYBE NOT THE 

RIGHT WORDING; 

AN HISTORICAL 

CATASTROPHE 

CAN BECOME 

NORMALISED 

OR NEUTRALISED. 

INSTEAD, I 

SHOULD SAY “I 

AM INTERESTED 

IN” YOUR FOCUS, 

SINCE WE ARE 

TALKING ABOUT 

A CHANGE IN THE 

NARRATIVE RIGHT 

NOW AS WE SPEAK. 

I AM WONDERING 

WHAT WILL 

HAPPEN TO THE 

STORY, WHO WILL 

TELL IT, HOW AND 

TO WHOM?! 

NAVID KERMANI, 

A GERMAN 

WRITER AND 

ORIENTALIST, 

RECENTLY WROTE 

AN ARTICLE IN 

ONE OF THE 

BIG GERMAN 

NEWSPAPERS, 

THE FAZ, WHERE 

HE POSES THE 

QUESTION OF 

THE FUTURE OF 

REMEMBERING. 

AUSCHWITZ 

TOMORROW 

AS THE ENGLISH 

TRANSLATION 

WOULD GO. 

HE BEGINS THE 

STORY WITH AN 

OBSERVATION. 

WITNESSES 

ARE SLOWLY 

BUT SURELY 

FADING AWAY. 

Photo: Tourismusbüro Ebensee 

ear Hadas, 

This is a letter. 

A letter in different parts. 

A letter in the age of 

post-intimacy. Of posteverything. 

WHAT HE 

OBSERVES IS THE 

SENSATION OF 

UNEASINESS AS 

SOON AS HE AND 

OTHERS PUT THE 

DEUTSCH BADGE 

ON THEIR CHEST, 

SIGNALLING THE 

LANGUAGE THEY 

HAD CHOSEN 

FOR THE 

GUIDED TOUR 

THROUGH 

AUSCHWITZ- 

BIRKENAU 

MEMORIAL AND 

MUSEUM. 

AS A SON 

OF IRANIAN 

IMMIGRANTS, HE 

RECALLS THIS AS A 

DEFINING MOMENT 

OF BECOMING 

DEUTSCH, 

UNCONDI- 

TIONALLY. 

WHAT HE AND 

OTHERS IN THE 

GROUP FELT 

WAS SHAME AND 

GUILT, FIRST AND 

FOREMOST. 

AFTER THE 

HORROR OF THE 

NAZI REGIME, 

IN THE SELF- 

CONCEPTION OF 

GERMAN SOCIETY. 

EVEN TO THE 

POINT, AS 

KERMANI WRITES, 

WHERE IN 1951 

(ALREADY) THE 

IMPLEMENTATION 

LAW FOR ARTICLE 

131 OF THE 

CONSTITUTION 

ENABLING THE 

REINTEGRATION 

OF FORMER CIVIL 

SERVANTS OF THE 

NAZI REGIME 

WAS JUSTIFIED 

AS NECESSARY IN 

ORDER FINALLY TO 

DRAW THE LINE. 

KERMANI'S 

EXAMPLES 

CONTINUE UP 

UNTIL THE 

PRESENT DAY, 

WITH HIS BELIEF 

THAT THE PERIODS 

OF TIME LEADING 

UP TO DEMANDING 

THESE FINAL LINE- 

DRAWINGS, UP 

TO DECLARING 

THE PAST AS 

OVERCOME, WILL 

BECOME SHORTER 

AND INCREASINGLY 

GUILELESS. 

A PERPETUUM 

MOBILE OF 

WISHES. 

WISHES FOR 

NORMALISATION. 

WHEN INDEED, AS 

KERMANI INSISTS, 

THIS LANGUAGE 

AND CULTURE 

WILL NEVER BE, 

CAN NEVER AND 

SHOULD NEVER BE, 

“NORMAL”. 

BUT THIS IS WHAT 

HE FEARS AS 


HAPPENS. 

AS TIME 

PROGRESSES. 

AS DEMOGRAPHICS 

CHANGE. 

IF A SOCIETY IS 

BUILT ON THE 

STORIES, RITUALS 

AND MYTHS THAT 

IT RECOUNTS 

IN ORDER TO 

REASSURE ITSELF, 

IT SHOULD 

ALSO INCLUDE 

THE NEGATIVE, 

THE BAD, THE 

THE DESIRE FOR 

NORMALISATION 

SOON BECAME A 

DRIVING FORCE 

EVIL ONES, AND 

AUSCHWITZ IS THE 

ULTIMATE EVIL OF 

GERMAN HISTORY 

AND SOCIETY, 

THE ULTIMATE 

CAESURA IN 

GERMAN HISTORY 

AND SOCIETY, ONE 

THAT CAN NEVER 

BE “NORMALISED”, 

CLAIMS KERMANI. 

BUT IT IS ALSO 

ONE THAT SHOULD 

NOT ONLY BE TOLD 

AS A STORY OF 

GUILT BUT AS A 

STORY OF BLANK 

SPACES THAT 

HAVE NEVER BEEN 

FILLED. 

A STORY 

OF LOSS. 

LOSS OF 

KNOWLEDGE, 

OF CULTURE, OF 

LANGUAGE. 

IN THE END, HE 

CONCLUDES, IT 

WILL COME DOWN 

TO STORYTELLING 

AGAIN. 

WHO TELLS THE 

STORY, HOW AND 

TO WHOM? 

SINCE WE ARE 

TALKING STORY. 

IT'S A VERY 

DIFFERENT ONE IN 

AUSTRIA. 

THE CONSTITUENT 

STORY WAS, WITH 

REFERENCE TO 

THE MOSCOW 

DECLARATION 

FROM 1943, ONE OF 

BEING THE FIRST 

VICTIM OF NAZI 

GERMANY. 

THERE NEVER 

REALLY WAS 

A STORY OF 

REMEMBRANCE, 

ONLY ONE OF 

FALLEN HEROES OF 

WAR, IMPORTANT 

ESPECIALLY FOR 

THE BONDS AND 

BOUNDARIES 

OF LOCAL 

COMMUNITIES, IN 

CONTRADICTION 

TO THE EQUALLY 

GLORIFYING 

REMEMBRANCE OF 

THE RESISTANCE. 

IT TOOK UNTIL 

THE END 

OF THE ‘80S 

BEFORE ALFRED 

HRDLICKA'S 

MONUMENT 

AGAINST 

6

5 

WAR AND 

FASCISM 

IT WAS MY FIRST 

VISIT HERE, I HAVE 

IN BETWEEN THE 

FAMILY HOMES. 

WAS WALKING 

THROUGH THE 

SITES, ABANDONED 

AND FORGOTTEN 

FALL/WINTER 

2015 ISSUE OF 

WAS BUILT 

TO ADMIT. 

TUNNEL. 

SITES, TUNNELS, 

SOUTH AS A STATE 

AROUND THE SAME 

THE MAIN SITE 

WHAT AFFECTED 

ETC. OVER A 

OF MIND, THE 

TIME, THE RISE 

I ALSO HAVE TO 

IS THE TUNNEL 

ME THE MOST WAS 

PERIOD OF YEARS. 

PUBLICATION THAT 

OF THE RIGHT- 

ADMIT THAT, 

IN THE NEARBY 

NOT ALL OF THE 

BECAUSE IF SO, 

ACCOMPANIED THE 

WING PARTY FPÖ 

UNTIL THEN, I 

MOUNTAINS. 

INFORMATION, ALL 

I WAS AND I AM 

INSTALLATION OF 

BEGAN, WITH 

HAD NEVER BEEN 

IT WAS MEANT AS 

OF THE PICTURES 

STILL WONDERING: 

DOCUMENTA14. 

JÖRG HAIDER AS 

TO A KZ BEFORE. 

A REPLACEMENT 

OF MASS GRAVES 

IS THIS 

THEIR LEADER, 

EBENSEE WAS 

FOR PEENEMÜNDE 

AND STARVED 

TRANSFORMATION? 

THERE HAS TO BE 

CULMINATING IN 

THE FIRST I EVER 

AFTER THEY 

BODIES, BUT MY 

A LANDSCAPE 

THE COALITION 

VISITED. 

ABANDONED THE 

REACTION. 

THEN I CERTAINLY 

FOR WANDERING 

GOVERNMENT 

WITH THE ÖVP IN 

2000, CONTINUING 

UNTIL NOW, 

WITH THE 

REPATRIATION 

OF THE TERM AND 

CONCEPT 

HEIMAT. 

HERE, IT ALWAYS 

WAS A STORY 

OF HIDING AND 

FORGETTING. 

MOST 

OF THE 

ORIGINAL 

CAMP NO 

LONGER 

EXISTS; 

INSTEAD, THERE 

ARE DETACHED 

HOUSES WITH 

SITE IN 1943. 

THE PLAN WAS TO 

CONTINUE THE 

DEVELOPMENT 

AND RESEARCH OF 

THE V-2 ROCKETS 

UNDERGROUND 

AND IN STECRET. 

WHEN THE US 

80TH INFANTRY 

DIVISION ARRIVED 

AT THE CAMP SITE 

ON 6TH MAY 1945, 

I WASN'T SHAKEN. 

I SIMPLY 

ACKNOWLEDGED 

THE FACTS AND 

THE PICTURES I 

WAS LOOKING AT. 

DON'T KNOW HOW 

TO HANDLE IT. 

THERE IS THIS 

OPENING VERSE 

OF A POEM THAT 

I KEEP CIRCLING 

AROUND AND 

I REMEMBER A 

TIME WHEN THIS 

WAS DIFFERENT. 

IN PLACE. 

I LIKE THE 

PICTURE OF A 

LANDSCAPE, ANY 

LANDSCAPE, THAT 

CAUSES MOTION, 

MOVEMENT. 

MOTION, 

MOVEMENT OF 

BODY AND, OF 

COURSE, OF MIND 

IT DEPENDS 

FENCES AROUND 

THE DEATH TOLL 

I REMEMBER A 

COMING BACK TO 

ON HOW I AM 

NOT ONE OF 

THEIR GARDENS. 

WAS AROUND 8500 

TIME WHEN I 

AGAIN AND AGAIN 

WANDERING 

EMPHASISING IT. 

WHAT THEY 

PEOPLE. 

COULDN'T SHAKE 

EVER SINCE I 

THROUGH A 

THIS IS EBENSEE, 

DID LEAVE AS 

OFF THE ANGER, 

STARTED WRITING 

LANDSCAPE AND 

LOOKING NORTH 

A REMINDER IS 

THEY CALLED IT 

THE DESPAIR, 

YOU THIS LETTER. 

WHERE I AM 

TOWARDS LAKE 

THE ORIGINAL 

PROJEKT ZEMENT. 

WHILE STANDING 

GOING TO. 

TRAUNSEE. 

ENTRANCE, FOR 

IN FRONT OF 

IT'S A VERSE 

I JUST RECENTLY 

EXAMPLE, THAT 

I READ ALL OF 

A VARIETY OF 

BY BRANDON 

VISITED THE 

TOWN. 

NOW SPANS A 

SMALL STREET 

THE INFORMATION 

ABOVE WHILE I 

MONUMENTS, 

REMEMBRANCE 

SHIMODA THAT 

I FOUND IN THE 

Christoph Szalay, writer, curator, and 

commissioner for literature at Forum 

Stadtpark Graz. 

LETTER FROM BERLIN 

REMEMBRANCE 

CLUTURE IN 

KREMS 

Max Czollek 

Reinhard Resch 

Liebe Hadas, 

bei dem Abendessen bei einem 

gemeinsamen Freund im 

Friedrichshain hattest du mir ja 

gesagt, dass du ein paar Polemiken 

von mir zugespielt haben möchtest. 

Und weil dieser Beitrag für ein 

österreichisches Publikum gedacht 

ist, fällt mir eine Diskussion ein, die 

ich mit Stefan Schmitzer nach der 

Montagsbühne in Graz begonnen 

habe. Dabei ging es um den letzten 

Zyklus aus den Jubeljahren, meinem 

zweiten Lyrikband, wo ein lyrisches 

Ich auf den Kabbalisten Isaak Luria 

trifft, dessen Ursprungsort, Safed, sich 

nunmehr in Galizien befindet. 

Der Titel des Textes ist auf Hebräisch, 

in dem Zyklus wimmelt es von 

Referenzen. Schmitzer ging es daher 

- wenig überraschend - um zweierlei: 

die Frage nach der Exklusivität des 

Textes für ein bestimmtes Publikum 

und die Frage, ob das Aufgreifen 

theologischer Referenzen nicht an 

sich problematisch sein könnte. 

Keine Ahnung, was genau er mit 

letzterem Punkt meinte, vielleicht 

ist Schmitzer ja radikaler Atheist, 

was ich respektiere, aber irgendwie 

ineffektiv finde. Wenn du einen 

Gläubigen angreifst, dann musst du es 

auf der Ebene des Glaubens tun, sonst 

verpufft das Ganze und am Ende 

redet man völlig aneinander vorbei. 

Zur Frage nach dem Verständnis 

und Grenzen des Verstehens ist 

für mich seit den Jubeljahren an 

unterschiedlichen Stellen immer 

wieder aufgetaucht. Denn es ist doch 

so: wenn man in Deutschland von 

den Juden spricht, dann hören die 

Deutschen (Kritiker, Lyriker) immer 

nur Auschwitz, Antisemitismus 

oder Israel. Es ist nahezu egal, was 

ich sage, der normale Jude kommt 

aus dem Stetl, ist aus Auschwitz 

befreit worden und dann zumindest 

teilweise nach Israel ausgewandert. 

Ein Jude ohne Familie in Israel? - 

undenkbar! Keine gute Geschichte 

zum Antisemitismus auf Lager? - 

langweilig! Keine Shoahgeschichte? 

- Enttäuschtes Murmeln, 

Themenwechsel. Der normale Jude ist 

der Überlebende. 

Da im öffentlichen Feuilleton und 

in der Lyrikszene fast nur Deutsche 

sprechen, bestimmt das auch die 

Position, die ich als Autor öffentlich 

einnehmen kann: is halt Judenlyrik, 

entweder lieb, oder böse, oder mit 

Chuzpe oder Witz. Wenn ich also 

öffentlich immer "Judenlyrik" schreibe 

no-matter-what, dann muss die 

Gegenseite auch sichtbar werden 

als das, was sie offensichtlich ist: 

Kartoffellyrik. Da wird dann nichts 

mehr erklärt, da wird einfach nur 

noch geschrieben, fuck Kunstkritik 

bzw. wir müssen ganz woanders 

anfangen, uns unseren eigenen 

Rezeptionsrahmen zu basteln. 

(Denn wo wären die Verhandlung 

deutsch-jüdischer Identität im 

deutschsprachigen Raum heute 

diskutierbar oder rezipierbar, ohne 

dass sie gleichzeitig im Kontext eines 

deutschen Begehrens nach den Juden 

stünde?!) 

Ein Bekannter von mir wies mal 

darauf hin, dass wir, wenn wir als 

Referenzrahmen eine Art allgemein 

geteiltes Wissen ansetzen, eigentlich 

nur Kunst produzieren können, die 

für einen 9-Klässler geeignet ist. 

Da kommt dann natürlich nichts 

Gescheites bei raus. Stattdessen 

plädiere ich für die produktive 

Überforderung. Denn die Grenzen 

des Wissens sind zugleich politische 

Grenzen, in denen sich das Verdrängte 

ebenso spiegelt wie das, was eine 

Gesellschaft für relevant hält. Wenn 

meine LeserInnen über das Judentum 

nicht mehr wissen, als dass es 

vernichtet wurde und schwarze 

Hüte trägt, dann ist der Rückgriff 

auf jüdische Traditionen zugleich 

eine Archäologie, die verschüttete 

Perspektiven wieder ausgräbt und 

in ihrer Relevanz für die Gegenwart 

befragt. 

Diese Strategie des Neuansetzens 

habe ich im Konzept der 

Desintegration zu bündeln versucht. 

Der gleichnamige Kongress Anfang 

Mai am Gorki Theater Berlin war 

einer Umsetzung dieses Konzeptes 

gewidmet. Dabei ging es mir 

letztendlich um die Erzeugung einer 

öffentlichen Diskursposition: Diese 

(desintegrierten) Juden sind nicht 

mehr verfügbar für ein deutsches 

Begehren nach den „Juden“, für die 

Konstruktion der eigenen Identität 

oder dieses ewige narzistische, 

unwürdig geheiligte und hochgradig 

clichierte Gerede über die Shoah. 

Denn das ganze Gedächtnistheater 

läuft doch letztlich auf eins hinaus: 

die Normalisierung der deutschjüdischen 

Verkeilung. An dieser 

Verkeilung ist nun aber nichts 

normal. Und wenn es nach mir geht, 

wird das auch so bleiben. 

Darum Rache als Topos der 

Selbstermächtigung (A.H.A.S.V.E.R, 

Verlagshaus Berlin 2016), darum 

das paranoische Schreiben als 

Gegenwartsbewältigung der 

deutschen Sprache (ebd.) oder eben 

die Erkundung der jüd. Theologie 

/ Theodizee als Ressource und 

Mittel der Differenzerzeugung. 

Alles lyrische Modi, Versuche „auf 

einem untergehenden Schiff aus 

der eigenen Haut zu entkommen“ 

(Brasch). Für den eingangs erwähnten 

Zyklus zu Isaak Luria könnte man 

Gershom Sholems Überlegungen 

zur Lurianischen Kabbalah lesen 

und ihre historische Einbettung in 

die Exilerfahrung. Das Konzept der 

ZimZum als freiwilliges Exil Gottes, 

was darauf hinauslaufen könnte, dass 

wir zwar nicht Schuld haben am 

Zustand der Welt, wohl aber, wenn 

sie einfach so bleibt. Das mag nahezu 

kitschig klingen, historisch ist es aber 

zugleich eine katastrophale Aussage, 

da sie den Opfern eine partielle 

Verantwortung zuweist an ihrer 

eigenen Verfolgung. Hätten sie eben 

mehr und härter beten sollen. 

Bestimmte Dinge liegen außerhalb 

der eigenen Einflussnahme. In der 

Gegenwart ist die Normalität ist eines 

dieser Konzepte, von denen wir uns 

dringend verabschieden sollten. Jude 

zu sein bedeutet, Unruhe zu stiften. 

Ich glaube, darauf sollten wir stolz 

sein! 

Mit herzlichen Grüßen aus Berlin, 

Max 

Max Czollek is a German poet, member 

of the G13 collective of authors, and 

curator of Babelsprech International 

Reinhard Resch, 

Mayor of the city of Krems. 

Why is it important to recondition 

this dark chapter of our city’s history? 

Because we should never forget. 

Shakespeare once called memories the 

„Guardians of the Brain“ and this is 

why remembrance is so important. We 

need to stay vigilant to avoid such 

repetition of processes. 

After the war, there was a lot of 

suppression and fading out. But as 

time came, events came back to light 

and people started to engage in 

processing the past. 

In the last years Krems developed a 

commemorative culture, starting from 

written thesis by students, annual 

memorial services or books about 

Krems between 1934 and 1945. 

As Primo Levi, a surviver of Auschwitz 

said: „It happened, and therefore it 

can happen again. There lies the core 

of what we have to say.

7 

NORMALISATION 

FROM THE 

PERSPECTIVE 

OF THE THIRD 

POST-WAR 

GENERATION 

The case of Poland 

Jagoda Budzik 

G 

eneration - a term that 

inherently refers to elapsed 

time: seems to also provide an 

opportunity to look inside the internal 

dynamics of the normalisation 

processes and the attempts to disrupt 

them. However, before we use the 

phrase “third generation” more 

generally, to refer not only to Israel or 

Germany, but also to other countries, 

particularly to Poland, it seems essential 

to pose the question about the very 

possibility of speaking about “Polish 

third generation” and the reasons why 

such a term hardly exists in Polish 

memory discourse, contrary to Israel 

and Germany. 

This intriguing fact may serve as a good 

starting point for a reflection on how 

Polish society in the post-war decades 

was dealing, or rather was avoiding 

having to deal with its past, and how 

- with time - the repressed facts started 

to come to the surface, breaking 

society’s efforts to maintain the state of 

normalisation. The latter process can be 

traced in various works created by a 

younger generation of artists. Moreover, 

it is worth emphasising the fact that 

they very often pick the genres and use 

motifs formerly not connected to the 

topic of the memory of the Second 

World War, the Holocaust, and 

Polish-Jewish relations. The examples I 

am going to present here are only a 

small part of the huge post-war 

memory boom that began to occur in 

Polish contemporary art and culture as 

early as the 1990s, but - for reasons I 

will discuss later on - became 

particularly noticeable in the 2000s. 

Polish spaces, from which traces of war 

history have been erased, in 

contemporary works are often shown to 

be haunted by the past. Having thus far 

been treated as inviolate, they began to 

reveal what Martin Pollack calls their 

actual “contamination”, arguing that 

landscapes of such countries as Austria, 

Slovenia, Romania, Ukraine, Czech 

Republic, and - above all - Poland will 

forever remain marked by the events of 

the Second World War. The motif of 

contamination of Polish soil with war 

crimes in general, and the Shoah in 

particular, has become discernible in the 

works of artists belonging to the third 

generation. It is entangled, however, with 

some significant issues that demand to be 

mentioned here. 

First of them is the fact of Poland’s 

exclusion from the contemporary 

reconciliation process, which has been 

described by Karolina Przewrocka in her 

widely commented-on essay published in 

the Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz. I am 

not going to analyse the whole article, 

where the author discusses extensively 

both the reasons and the consequences of 

this lack of Polish voice in Israeli-German 

memory discourse. Instead, I would like 

to focus on just one fragment where 

Przewrocka defines in precise terms one 

of the main problems of Polish memory: 

The Jewish cemeteries scattered 

throughout Poland, together with the 

remains of the death camps, ghettos and 

synagogues, are with us every day. We 

wake up to them in the morning, pass 

them on our way to work and go to sleep 

at night in cities whose names evoke fear 

in Israelis, including Oswiecim, Lodz and 

Kielce. 

She adds: 

When Israeli Jews visit Poland’s Holocaust 

sites, they return to Israel with a sense of 

relief. We, in contrast, must find a way to 

continue to live alongside these places, 

unable to exorcise this dybbuk. 

The situation of struggle with the past 

Przewrocka describes 

is, however, quite a 

new phenomenon. In 

the first post-war 

decades, what prevailed 

in Poland was the 

atmosphere of silence 

and repression of the 

traumatic event’s 

memory. The rising 

consciousness of this 

situation started to 

appear more frequently 

in art and in literature 

only at the end of the 

twentieth century. 

Nevertheless, the most 

meaningful turning 

point in that process of 

breaking the 

normalisation of the 

spaces came in 2000, 

together with 

publication of Sąsiedzi 

(“The Neighbours”), a 

book written by the 

Polish sociologist and 

historian Jan Tomasz 

Gross, in which he 

describes the history of 

one of the pogroms on 

Jewish inhabitants of 

the town Jedwabne, 

planned and carried 

out by their Polish 

neighbours. Although 

the crime has been 

already depicted in a 

magnificent 

documentary movie … 

Where My Elder Son Kain (1999), 

directed by Agnieszka Arnold 

(who in 2001 also released a second 

documentary on the pogrom, entitled 

Sąsiedzi, from which the book in fact 

borrowed its title), the film did not get 

much attention, and it was the Gross 

essay that dramatically changed the 

shape of the discourse on Polish-Jewish 

relations in Poland. 

The debate launched by this 

publication constituted a precedent in 

the history of Polish afterwar narrative 

of Polish-Jewish relations, and cracked 

the façade of silence which had been 

kept up for decades with regard to 

Polish attitudes towards the Jews 

before, during, and after the Second 

World War. The book not only 

revealed the truth about what has been 

the most strongly repressed thread of 

this story, namely, Polish complicity in 

murders committed on the Jews, but 

also allowed to highlight the question 

of Jewish absence, its reasons and 

consequences - both in the public 

debate and in art or literature, 

particularly in works of young artists 

belonging mostly to the third postwar 

generation. 

The persistent lack of former Jewish 

citizens of Poland and the places they 

used to live in seems to be one the 

central motifs in works that have been 

created in recent years and might be 

perceived as connected to the third 

generation’s experience. The first work I 

would like to discuss is Yael Bartana’s 

project And Europe will be stunned 

from 2009. The work consists of three 

parts and presents a vision of a Jewish 

Renaissance Movement in Poland that 

calls three milions Jews to come back. 

Although the motif of the void left 

after the murder of over three milions 

of Polish Jews is present in all parts, it is 

the first section, entitled “Mary 

koszmary” (“Nightmares”), that 

presents it in the most apparent way. 

In the first part of the trilogy, Sławomir 

Sierakowski, leader of “Krytyka 

Polityczna”, stands in the empty 

Decennial Stadium in Warsaw and calls 

the Jews to come back to their country. 

In his charismatic speech, which on the 

one hand may be likened to 

propaganda films from the Third Reich 

(particularly Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph 

of the Will), but on the other hand, is 

set in a space that is highly charged 

with symbolic meaning, Sierakowski 

urges: 

Jews! Fellow Countrymen! People! 

Peeeople! You think the old woman 

who still sleeps under Ryfke’s quilt 

doesn’t want to see you? That she forgot 

about you? You are wrong! She dreams 

about you every night. Dreams and 

POLISH SOCIETY IN THE 

POST-WAR DECADES WAS 

DEALING, OR RATHER WAS 

AVOIDING HAVING TO DEAL 

WITH ITS PAST, AND HOW - 

WITH TIME - THE REPRESSED 

FACTS STARTED TO COME 

TO THE SURFACE, BREAKING 

THE SOCIETY’S EFFORTS TO 

TO MAINTAIN THE STATE OF 

NORMALISATION. 

trembles with fear. Since the night you 

were gone and her mother reached your 

quilt, she has had nightmares. Bad 

dreams. Only you can chase them away. 

Let the three million Jews that Poland 

has missed stand by her bed and finally 

chase away the demons. Return to 

Poland, to your country! (...). 

This potential situation of Jews 

returning to Poland has in fact more 

than just one possible interpretation. 

The mechanism whereby the repressed 

return leads in two directions. On the 

one hand, it illustrates how deeply 

rooted the normative Polish silence 

about the former Jewish neighbours is; 

on the other hand, it refers to the issue 

of Jewish settlement in former 

Palestine, which has often been 

described in terms of “coming back to 

the historical homeland”. Seen from 

the Polish perspective, hovewer, 

Bartana’s work not only refers to the 

fact that memory of three and a half 

million Jews who lived in Poland before 

the war has been repressed from 

collective consciousness, but also points 

towards the dread the Poles are filled 

with owing to the recollection of 

property grabbed from their Jewish 

neighbours, or the remembrance of 

many Polish crimes committed during 

the Shoah. Therefore, the void left after 

the genocide of Jewish inhabitants 

gains more specific 

form. 

A significant shift 

occurred, therefore, at 

the time when the 

representatives of the 

third postwar 

generation took the 

floor: the motif of 

Jewish absence and a 

thread of an active role 

played by Poles in the 

process of forgetting 

have entered the 

cultural mainstream. 

The consequences of 

these phenomena have 

also gradually started 

to be more visible in 

Polish texts from the 

field of popular 

culture, whose authors 

try to deal with the 

issue of Polish history. 

The subject of 

forgotten Jewish 

victims of the Second 

World War appears, 

for example, in two 

Polish movies that 

reached the wider 

public: Pokłosie 

(“Aftermath”) by 

Władysław Pasikowski 

and Demon by Marcin 

Wrona. Both of them 

- although in different 

ways - present the 

outcome of post-war 

silence concealing the 

traces left after the Holocaust victims. 

Both films, similar because they adopt 

the form of popular thrillers, show that 

what preserves the memory repressed 

by the Polish people is precisely the 

space. In each case, the protagonist 

familiarises himself with the 

surroundings and suddenly discovers 

the truth about what happened before 

and during the war, only to learn that 

the inhabitants are still very eager to 

keep their dark secrets. In both cases, 

the attempt at normalisation fails at 

some point, for the long-hidden facts 

come to light. However, it offers 

neither a sense of catharsis, nor an 

opportunity to settle with the past, for 

it remains unreachable owing to Polish 

reluctance to do so as well as still-vivid 

anti-Semitism, which is underlined in 

both movies in a very critical way. 

Another, and probably one of the most 

literal and radical uses of the motif of 

such a comeback of the past, comes 

from the field of literature. In Noc 

żywych Żydów (“The Night of the 

Living Jews”), Igor Ostachowicz tells 

the story of Jewish zombies rising from 

the basements of Warsaw. In his rather 

lowbrow novel, the zombies become an 

obvious pop-cultural symbol of 

unwanted memory. Although it follows 

the pattern of a popular novel, Noc 

żywych Żydów in fact reflects the 

Polish struggle for normalisation and 

eagerness to repress the memory of 

what happened in spaces of 

contemporary everyday life (one of the 

novel’s most important locales is 

“Arkadia”, an enormously large 

shopping centre built on the premises 

of the former Warsaw ghetto), at the 

same time becoming a testament of 

their failure. However, Ostachowicz’s 

novel is also unable to offer a sense of 

catharsis. It is rather a report on Polish 

unreadiness for a confrontation with 

the memory of the Jews who used to 

inhabit the same well-known places we 

live in today. 

From this perspective, the general 

experience of the Polish third 

generation is strongly connected to 

space, which on the one hand remains 

a place where the European Jewry was 

exterminated, and on the other hand is 

the space of today’s Polish life. At the 

same time, after many years of silence, 

members of the third generation are 

those who experience - probably most 

strongly - the return of the repressed, 

return of the forgotten Jewish history. 

The central role in this process is played 

by places which over the decades have 

been strenuously adjusted to avoid any 

kind of suffering as a result of a guilty 

conscience or traumatic memories. For 

some time, however, the ghosts of the 

past have haunted them, showing that 

Polish society - even though it is still 

reluctant - will eventually be forced to 

face its fears and confront the past. 

Jagoda Budzik is a doctoral student at the 

Faculty of Polish and Classical Philology 

at Adam Mickiewicz University in 

Poznań. She has degrees in Hebrew 

Studies and Theatre Studies from the same 

university. Her research interests focus on 

issues of collective memory, Israeli 

literature, theatre and visual arts in the 

light of the Holocaust discourse. Her work 

combines elements drawn from three 

major disciplines: literature, memory 

studies and cultural studies.

I 

t wasn't exactly Qalandiya 

checkpoint. We used to stand 

there on the wall of the airport, like, 

as support for the guys securing the 

airport. There were disturbances and 

we fired, what do you call it? … 

Rubber. Rubber bullets and stun 

grenades, and all day long we played 

tag with the kids who were throwing 

stones. 

THIS STORY 

WAS TAKEN FROM 

A TESTIMONY 

OF AN ISRAELI 

SOLIDER 

We put up booby traps.Yeah, Booby 

traps. Let me tell you something a 

little funny: 

We put an ammo case with a stun 

grenade inside, loosened the safety 

and put pudding on top, Danny 

pudding that we'd lifted from the 

kitchen. Then the kids came, looked 

at the pudding, and the moment they 

lifted it the safety opened and the 

pudding exploded in their faces. This 

was one thing. 

I'll give you another example: 

There was this sofa standing in the 

centre, and they kept moving it 

around all day long. It was the regular 

place where they would throw stones 

from, and we got fed up with the fact 

that they were using that sofa. So we 

booby trapped the sofa with a stun 

grenade, for instance. It was me and 

the company commander, who by the 

way was hurt while doing it, the shock 

grenade exploded in his face . . . Such 

things. Those were the days. 

This story was taken from testimony 

of an Israeli soldier from the archive 

of the human rights organisation 

"Breaking the Silence". 

Dafna Staretz is a nomadic artist born 

in an Israeli kibbutz; currently living 

and working in Bergen, Norway. She 

creates fragmentary watercolour 

assemblages, which depict stories of 

liquid modernity. 

COMFERTBLE SOFA 

Dafna Staretz 

Comfortable Sofa, painting by Dafna Staretz 

THE 

IMPORTANCE 

OF ART 

PROJECTS 

FOR THE 

AWARENESS 

OF HISTORY 

Angeliki Douveri 

This, though, can be 

1 

understandable on the 

part of the people that experienced the 

trauma and its aftermath, but what 

about the historians? There is actually a 

History Department at the otherwise 

renowned University of Crete in 

Rethymno, where we found out - owing 

to the project research - that they focus 

on all sorts of other eras than the recent 

one! We were finally directed towards 

two PhD alumni who have researched 

WWII on the island and were the only 

ones that seem to have done so. Why is 

there not permanent research dedicated 

to recent history? Does the funding 

system justify this by itself? 

OR DOES THE TRAUMA 

OF THE PEOPLE 

BECOME A TABOO FOR 

THE FACULTY? 

Art can soothe and heal 

The questions may go on, and I am far 

from being an expert on issues of history. 

As a civilian, though, I was amazed and 

disappointed that we look away from 

what happened to our parents and 

grandparents. At the same time as an 

artist, I found it extremenly useful to 

have art as a vehicle to approach the 

people and such delicate matters. Time is 

precious as a vast amount of historical 

information is dying along with the 

people who witnessed the events. 

It has done so for sickness, both physical 

and mental. Let us support such 

practices on history issues as well and use 

it as a tool for raising awareness and 

understanding, of bridging and building 

peace. It is not redundant, it is an urgent 

matter. 

Angeliki Douveri is an artist and an 

ArtAmari founder. 

A BATTERED 

CHICKEN IN 

FINE BAROQUE 

SURROUNDINGS 

Does a picture really say more 

than thousand words? 

Robert Streibel 

Translation: Nigel A. James 

F 

or very many years, the historian 

had been writing a history based 

on a postcard. A town decorated with 

flags. Who had the longest, and who 

had nothing - improvisation. The red 

Wachau sky, the wind lightly touching 

the girls' aprons, and the swastika. A 

sea of flags. Only one appearing out of 

place. One with runes. Someone had 

wanted to be more. The SS beside the 

town's landmark, as if it had nothing to 

say. An outlaw not interested in death. 

Not in 1938. A rumour becomes 

history and a photo says more than 

1000 words. The greased head. The 

parting combed straight. The Hitler 

moustache. A double 

- like so many at the 

time. Alles Klar, Herr 

Kommissar? Enough 

for a judgement. A 

complete picture. A 

gut feeling. That's how 

it was with this type of 

complete work of art. 

The intellect - hard 

done by. 

And that's how the 

story came to be, and 

that's how the 

historian presented it. 

The house decorated 

with flags was an inn, 

the Arkadenhof. But 

the flags were no 

reason to boycott it. 

The historian was in 

no way so inflexible. 

Why not a beer in the Arkadenhof; 

why not celebrate end of school exams 

there, why not escape from the hot 

summer heat there? Why not? Even 

though Hitler took the train, we still 

use it. Only very few listen to 

Lohengrin, but being punctual does not 

make one a Mussolini fan. 

Everything was fine and would have 

continued to be so if it hadn't been for 

the phone call that had come from the 

monastery. The monastery, which was 

on a hill and clearly visible, had been 

dispossessed 

to the advantage of the town. Not the 

empire, the town had been victorious. 

Out of pure pleasure and joy, many had 

given one or two priests a slight box 

around the ears. And, it wasn't only 

the mayor who had revelled in the 

newly acquired furniture, antiques, 

Baroque with silk coverings, and gold. 

It was also to be a pleasure for the next 

1000 years. The furniture warehouse of 

the monastery became a training centre 

for civil servants and the Hitler Youth, 

and also a stopover for refugees and the 

NAPOLA. 

It was during this time that the grating 

that had separated the secular from the 

divine since the Baroque time at the 

convent was taken down and removed. 

If desks had been spirited across the 

Danube, then why not this as well? 

The grating then became the splendour 

of the inn - near the town's landmark. 

Surely, that was no coincidence. The 

grating was the perfect match for the 

complete art work, just like the Hitler 

moustache and the runes. 

The search for the desks, chairs, picture 

frames and works of art began at the 

premature end of the 1000-year empire. 

All that was recovered found its way 

home once again. Only the stolen 

stamp collection was never seen again. 

And the grating stayed where it was. 

There where it brought joy. Baroque in 

a Baroque room in the inn. 

And then someone came who couldn't 

remember but had been told of the 

rumour concerning the grating. Times 

were different then, and what was then 

stolen was now only borrowed. And, in 

any case, who wants to ask awkward 

questions. The rumour remained, and 

the photos led to discussions between 

the historian and the priest. Together 

they went to 

the inn, the 

Baroque 

room. Why 

no battered 

chicken in 

the Baroque 

room? And 

didn't the 

rumour 

deserve a 

simple 

question? 

Where had 

the grating 

come from? 

A Hitler 

moustache, a 

rune, and a 

grating in 

exile. These 

sit nicely in a 

town whose 

mayor rose 

like a 

phoenix from secretary in the Nazi 

times to mayor in the late 1950s. What 

is all this compared to long forgotten 

grating? 

The answer was served for dessert after 

the battered chicken. It came as 

quickly as the loganberry schnaps. No! 

The owner of the inn had nothing to 

do with Hitler. The owner of the inn 

had simply loved art, and his son had 

fallen at the front. I'm very attached to 

the grating, but make me an offer. The 

winter came, 

then a new 

spring, the 

colours as 

fresh as the 

Baroque was 

light, and 

once again it 

was battered 

chicken 

time. And 

once again 

the same old 

question. 

Enquiries at 

the antique 

dealer 

- where had 

the grating 

supposedly 

been 

purchased 

- had 

resulted in 

an offer of 

between 

1,500 and 2.000 Euro. That's how far 

the monastery was prepared to go. 

The answer was a memorial to Baroque, 

not genuine, but composed of different 

pieces. What happened in 1938, and 

what was 1945, and what was invented 

like so many vaults of thinking? How 

Family Wasservogel owned an electrical 

store - seen on the right sight of this 

postcard. They wrote this postcard to 

their friends, family Rephan, who left 

Krems 1932 for Palestine. The notice 

written mentions somebody who wished 

to buy the shop. Significant is the notice: 

In reality, there are 10 more flags in the 

street than are shown in this photo. 

Archiv Robert Streibel 

can anyone know? 

The master of the house was no pure 

Aryan. And when the Nazis came into 

the country, the SS was quartered 

here, and just because he was not a 

friend he had to hide. Then, as a 

woman, he went disguised among the 

SS. Later, he grew a beard. And so, 

with a Hitler moustache and the 

straightly combed parting, he got 

through. His brother had to emigrate 

to America, but he stayed and lost 

neither his life nor the hotel. But he 

lost a son in Italy. Somehow, the 

grate had arrived. Was it bought, or 

was it a miracle? It was there and 

should remain. But if the hotel were 

to be closed and sold, the grate would 

be taken back to its place on the 

mountain, and once again separate 

the Convent from the public. It 

would go back in its place. In twenty 

years; in thirty perhaps. Such a 

surprise had never been on the menu 

in this inn. 

But what does it matter? The 

monastery has been sitting on the top 

of the hill for the last 931 years. 30 

years is a short space of time. A short 

interregnum. 

But who now will write a new story 

about the SS flag, the Hitler 

moustache, and the grid? The picture 

will not be right anymore. “Nichts ist 

klar, Herr Kommissar”. And a picture 

says only as much as you know. Only 

the battered chicken is eternal.

9 

T 

he plastic skin of the mask is red. 

It has a big bulbous nose like the 

symptoms long term alcoholics suffer 

from. Black frizzy hair. Horns sprout 

from its forehead. Yellow rotting teeth. 

IT’S KARNEVAL 

IN UPPER AUSTRIA. 

Party-time: She is undecided. Should 

she dress up as a pirate or sailor moon. 

She is wearing a sailor skirt already. 

The chest of costumes is empty. Its 

contents strewn all over the living room 

floor. 

Her boyfriend Boris —although they 

are too shy to call themselves a 

couple— sits on the sofa. He is 

already dressed up as his dream 

vocation: a philosopher. He wears a 

black turtle neck and beret set askew. 

He practices looking pensive. 

A crush and curiosity are the reason 

she finds herself here, in provincial, 

rural Austria. In search of her roots, 

perhaps subconsciously in search of 

understanding her father’s hometown. 

Her father never talks about his past. 

She puts on the Krampus mask. 

Boris looks her up and down. 

“You look like a Jew”, he says out of 

nowhere 

and laughs. 

She does not laugh, panic sets in. 

A feeling of estrangement sets in. 

A feeling, she has never felt like this 

and she is well-traveled. 

Admittedly, his choice of word is not 

directly directed against her. 

Maybe the comment resonates so 

strongly after the experience earlier 

that afternoon. Over coffee and cake, 

Boris’ nice aunt proudly proclaimed 

that her first born son wanted to 

dress up as a basketball player for 

carnival. She had spent all day, 

combing different stores, trying to 

find just the right color of tanning 

lotion. 

In general, Max Frisch applies: if you 

are made a Jew in Andorra, it does 

not matter if you actually are one. 

You are one. 

When are you really something? 

She was always jealous of people who 

knew exactly where they stood on the 

ground. 

Which passport or which hood 

formulated their being. They could 

celebrate their homeland with food, 

drink, costumes and dialects. Maybe 

that is why she kept falling in love with 

country boys, because she could widen 

their horizons and she could dig in the 

soil. 

It is a little bit embarrassing that a lot 

of her Jewish identity formulated itself 

based on negative encounters with men. 

Out of these interpersonal frictions it 

even became necessary to take a 

position. Nowadays everybody wants to 

hear stories of empowerment, no sob 

stories of victimisation. The Bat 

Mitzwahs of her New Yorker cousins, 

the worries of her mother and the 

history of her grandfather - how he 

survived in Austria: hidden and 

hustling on the black market with his 

Romanian passport - were the family 

story, not yet her own definition of self. 

After the first innocent and ignorant 

caresses, her first boyfriend had said: 

“It’s true. Jewish girls give good blow 

jobs.” Sometimes he would joke: “I love 

your ‘big nose’.” He really meant no 

harm, but it was pretty big downer in 

the bedroom. Apparently, it left a 

wound. 

Once, in a Viennese hipster joint, a 

German dude took her aside. There 

where a flirty vibe. They talked about 

where they were from. She said she was 

originally from the States. He reached 

into her hair, picked out a curl. The 

gesture was strange. He purred, “You 

are a Jew, right?”. His Jew-radar 

suddenly made his blond hair seem 

blonder and his eyes seem very blue. 

But at the time, she really did not know 

who she was. She was raised without 

denomination. That was freedom. She 

was raised in the strict belief that the 

Christmas tree was the “Hanukkah 

#KRAMPUS 

Definition: The Krampus is a 

horned folklore figure described 

as "half-goat, half-demon”. 

During the Christmas season, 

he punishes and whips naughty 

children. 

Text & Illustration: Nina Prader 

bush”. Once, for Chrismukkah, the 

family had miso soup and a pine tree 

decorated with david stars. Those in 

between spaces were here truth. 

Her reaction in these liminal zones in 

Vienna made her involuntarily feel 

unsafe in her environments. Her 

existence felt at risk and her trust 

towards somebody whom she actually 

wanted to love became shaky. 

Somebody that she was trying to 

understand, could not understand her, 

because he did not have the language to 

understand her being. Maybe he even 

unconsciously denounced a part of her. 

And, his ancestors hat persecuted her 

ancestors! 

Maybe she was also just paranoid. A 

subliminal dowry her Jewish mother 

- also non-denominational - had 

gifted her with. Here, the World War 

II filter was strongly in place, that is: 

if you had lived during those times 

what would you have done? Even if 

you are not a Halachic Jew, even as a 

quarter of a Jew, you would qualify to 

be sent to a concentration camp. So, 

be careful, brown waters run deep in 

the present. You only carefully tell 

those closest to you that you are 

Jewish, all others could be Gestapoequivalents 

of today and could still 

denounce you! 

When her grandfather died, her 

identity gained visibility in her circle 

of friends for the first time because 

she immediately had to go to the 

Jewish cemetery: TOR 4. She 

encountered a further estrangement. 

A friend said, when she saw his 

photo: Your grandfather had a big 

nose, was he a Jew? Numbly, she said, 

“Yes”. 

The question is: Is this anti-Semitism 

if it is true? If it is not true? Is it also 

anti-Semitism? Is it forgivable? Are 

there shades of grey? With which verbal 

tools can one combat this? The answer 

is, there is a spectrum of unmindful 

language, ignorance, curiosity and 

xenophobia. In general, it is strange to 

jump to conclusions, based on 

appearances, let alone use it as a 

pick-up line. 

In Salzburg a man said to her: “You 

must surely be a Jew, your features are 

so asymmetrical.” Indignantly, she 

made him aware of the anti-Semitic 

nature of his comment. He said, “ I 

worked in a Kibbutz, I am aloud to say 

stuff like that. I always fall for Jewish 

girls because they are so smart.” She left 

the conversation. 

Admitting to being a Jew is not 

conducive to fostering understanding. 

What that means generally or 

personally is not enough. It is definitely 

not enough to humiliate or change an 

anti-Semite. You have to work with 

subtlety or wordplay. 

In upper Austria, she forgave Boris 

because he was so beautiful and she was 

so shallow. 

But honestly, it was a conscious blind 

eye. Boris never understood the hurt. 

“Anti-Semitism” is not the right word. 

These people are not against “the Jews”, 

some have a fetish for the Jewesses. At 

the core, they are just careless. 

Once tipsy, a friend accompanied her 

home, he asked: “Do you live in the 

second district because you are a Jew?” 

Confused about the logic, she said: 

“No.” 

But the best place to live in Vienna is 

the second district. She thinks about it 

as her hood now. She pretends now that 

Vienna has the melting pot character of 

America because she does not want to 

hide from her family history. She says: I 

am a Jew because she has an 

unquenchable Wanderlust, doubting is 

a competitive sport for her and like her 

grandfather, she tries to practice 

courage every day. 

Nina Prader is a text and image artist 

and arts and culture writer based in 

Vienna and Berlin. She works with zines, 

artist books and most recently a radio 

show called “Paper&Tape" on printed 

matters.

G E D A N K E N 

Ü B E R D A S 

S C H W E I G E N 

V O N 

O R T E N , 

D I E 

einseitige Hinwendung zum 

Holocaust, zur nationalsozialistischen 

Vernichtungsmaschinerie und ihren 

zahllosen Opfern, nicht wiederum den 

Blick verstellt auf das Leben der 

Menschen und ihrer Kultur, also zu 

einer zweiten Auslöschung führen 

kann. 

Die großen Gedenkstätten sind keine 

Orte des Schweigens, des 

Verschweigens und keine Leerstellen 

per se, auch wenn vieles was Menschen 

an diesen Orten geschah für immer im 

Dunkeln bleiben muss. 

Es sind symbolisch aufgeladene Orte, 

Orte, die das staatlich verordnete 

völlige Außerkraftsetzen von jeglichen 

moralischen Schranken, wie es z.B. 

und in gnadenloser Konsequenz im 

Nationalsozialistischen Staat geschah, 

symbolisieren. Orte, an denen der 

Opfer gedacht wird, wie unvermögend 

auch immer. In ihrem fast 

unvorstellbaren Grauen stehen sie aber 

nur für einen Endpunkt in der 

Entwicklung dieser totalitären 

Diktatur, deren gewalttätige Anfänge 

ganz klein in Form von alltäglichen 

Ausgrenzungen begannen. An 

unzähligen Orten, die von sich aus 

nichts erzählen, wurde Unrecht zu 

Recht gebogen, wurde Menschen 

Gewalt angetan, mussten Menschen, 

immer die „Anderen“, leiden und 

sterben. Und das nicht nur in dieser 

Zeit, mit der wir uns hier 

beschäftigen. 

Ö 

sterreich ist schön. Krems ist 

schön. Die Umgebung von 

Krems ist schön...* Schon als ich das 

erste Mal nach Krems kam, ich glaube 

es war mit Verwandten aus 

Niederösterreich in den frühen 1970er 

Jahren, und auch später dann, von 

Wien aus, war ich immer wieder 

begeistert von der Schönheit der Stadt, 

der historischen Architektur, der 

schönen Lage als Tor zur Wachau, dem 

Blick auf das mächtige Stift Göttweig, 

die Donau, die umgebenden 

Weinberge. Die Menschen waren 

freundlich, ich kam immer gerne 

hierher. Das hat sich nicht geändert, 

seitdem ich täglich von Wien nach 

Krems fahre um als Kurator in der 

Kunsthalle Krems zu arbeiten. Die 

Kunsthalle, die unlängst frisch 

renoviert wiedereröffnet wurde, ist 

seit über 20 Jahren ein Ort für die 

Auseinandersetzung mit 

zeitgenössischer Kunst. Das Gebäude, 

eine alte Tabakmanufaktur aus dem 

Jahr 1852, in den 1990er Jahren von 

Adolf Krischanitz umgebaut, 

verströmt auch heute noch den 

Charme von Industriegebäuden des 

19. Jahrhunderts. Ein Ort also der 

Kunst und der Schönheit? Lässt man 

einmal die sicher unwürdigen 

E I N M A L 

T A T O R T E 

W A R E N 

Festhalten, Erinnern, Mahnen, Bezeichnen, Reden? 

Andreas Hoffer 

Arbeitsbedingungen in einer 

Manufaktur des 19. Jahrhunderts 

außer Acht, bleibt die Verstrickung des 

Ortes und seiner handelnden Personen 

mit und in der Zeit des 

Nationalsozialismus. Wie viele andere 

Orte in Krems (und natürlich nicht 

nur hier!) waren auch die Tabakfabrik 

und jetzige Kunsthalle und andere 

Orte der Kunstmeile in der Zeit des 2. 

Weltkrieges Orte, die nicht unbelastet 

sind, seitdem hier auch 

Zwangsarbeiter/innen arbeiten 

mussten - diesen Teil ihrer Geschichte 

geben die Gebäude allerdings nicht 

preis. Laut mündlicher Information 

von Zeitzeugeninterviews, die der 

Historiker Robert Streibel geführt hat, 

haben in der ehemaligen Tabakfabrik, 

als dort gegen Ende des 2. Weltkrieges 

Maschinenteile gebaut wurden, 

sogenannte Fremdarbeiter gearbeitet. 

Außerdem war auf dem Gelände der 

ehemaligen Teppichfabrik Eybl, wo 

sich jetzt die Studios der Artist in 

Residence Künstler/innen, das 

Literaturhaus, das Atelier der 

Kunstmeile und andere kulturelle 

Einrichtungen befinden, ein 

Zwangsarbeiterlager mit einer 

Wiederverwendungsproduktion von 

Patronenhülsen. 

Als Deutscher der frühen 

Nachkriegsgeneration bin ich es ja 

eigentlich gewohnt dem trügerischen 

Glanz der Schönheit oder Normalität 

von Orten zu misstrauen, zu sehr sind 

sie spätestens seit der Zeit von 1933 

bis 1945, der Zeit des 

Nationalsozialismus, ihrer 

vordergründigen Unschuld beraubt. In 

meiner Schul- und Studienzeit war ich 

ständig mit der jüngsten deutschen 

Geschichte und ihren Folgen 

konfrontiert. Ich sah in der nahen 

norddeutschen Umgebung einige 

Gelände, manchmal eine Weide oder 

Blumenwiese, manchmal als 

Bundeswehr Kaserne oder 

Firmengelände genutzt, die vor 1945 

kleine Außenlager von sogenannten 

Konzentrationslagern, oder 

Zwangsarbeiterlager waren. 

Wenn wir so etwas erfuhren, dann 

war ich fassungslos und schockiert 

und empört, dass diese Orte - 

insbesondere erinnere ich mich an ein 

ehemaliges Arbeitslager, dass von der 

Bundeswehr genutzt wurde - so 

normal waren, wie jeder andere Ort 

auch. Nichts wies auf die Gewalt und 

den Schrecken hin, die hier einmal 

geherrscht hatten, es waren 

schweigende Orte. Dass hier Tatorte 

waren, dass dort Unrecht geschah - es 

war nicht zu erkennen. Die 

jugendliche Empörung darüber hatte 

natürlich in der Rückschau auch etwas 

Pubertäres und war wohl auch von 

Selbstgerechtigkeit bestimmt, aber das 

war meine erste persönliche Erfahrung 

mit dem Verschweigen. Aus der 

jugendlichen Empörung wuchs 

immerhin Interesse, Neugier: Was war 

da noch? Welcher Idylle kann ich 

noch trauen und wie war es mit den 

eigenen Eltern, Verwandten, 

Nachbarn? Da blieben viele Fragen 

offen, oft auch ungefragt. 

Es folgten fast manisch Besuche von 

Gedenkstätten, zum Beispiel 

ehemaligen Konzentrationslagern, 

sowie das fast gierige Verschlingen von 

kritischer Literatur zur Zeit des 

Nationalsozialismus, von Biografien, 

der Auseinandersetzung mit der 

jüdischen Religion. In der Rückschau 

hatte auch diese Phase meiner Jugend 

etwas sehr Deutsches, Gründliches, 

eigentümlich Fokussiertes an sich - 

vielleicht ein mögliches, typisches 

Verhalten als Sohn von Tätern und 

Mitläufern? 

Die Besuche von ehemaligen Lagern, 

Vernichtungslagern, Gedenkstätten 

haben bei mir neben dem Schrecken, 

dem Grauen und nächtlichen 

Albträumen oft auch eine gewisse 

Ratlosigkeit erzeugt - auch angesichts 

von Menschenmassen, die dorthin 

fuhren und irgendwie fast wie bei 

einer Touristenattraktion 

„durchgeschleust“ wurden. Daraus 

entwickelten sich später, als ich schon 

Kulturvermittler in Wien war, ganz 

grundsätzliche Fragen des Vermittelns. 

Wie geht man wirklich mit einem 

solchen Tatort um? Welche Form und 

welchen Inhalt gibt man einer 

sogenannten Gedenkstätte - mahnend, 

pathetisch, analysierend, informativ? 

Wer spricht dort? Aus welcher 

Perspektive wird erzählt? Will man 

emotionale Reaktionen oder soll eher 

kognitiv vermittelt werden? Was kann 

so ein Gedenkort leisten? Was 

bewirken Texte, Fotos, Filme bei den 

Besucher/innen? Was erreicht einen 

Menschen wirklich? Was könnte dazu 

führen das eigene Denken und 

Handeln vielleicht zu beeinflussen, 

selber weiter Fragen zu stellen abseits 

von kurzfristiger Erschütterung. Es 

gibt dazu ja viele divergierenden 

Theorien, bis hin zur Frage, ob die 

Wie tiefgreifend eine Diktatur in der 

Lage ist, in das Leben einzugreifen, 

Moral außer Kraft zu setzen, Gewalt 

zu forcieren und damit alle Bereiche 

des persönlichen Lebens verformt und 

darin eingreift, wird nur deutlich, 

wenn man erfährt, wie alltäglich und 

„normal“ Terror gegen die „Anderen“ 

in einer Diktatur wird. Und das genau 

dort, wo man lebt oder arbeitet, an 

diesen Orten des normalen 

alltäglichen Lebens heute, wo Terror, 

Gewalt und unwürdiges Leben einmal 

alltäglich waren. 

Dass wir uns dessen bewusst werden 

und nicht der „endlosen 

Unschuldigkeit“, wie Elfriede Jelinek 

es genannt hat, anheimfallen, dafür ist 

es notwendig, dass es Menschen gibt 

wie die Künstlerin Hadas Tapouchi, 

die in Zentraleuropa Orte 

recherchiert, an denen im Zweiten 

Weltkrieg Zwangsarbeiter arbeiten 

mussten und diese heute „normalen“ 

Orte fotografiert und kartographiert, 

um auf sie aufmerksam zu machen. 

Als Gastkünstlerin bei AIR - Artist in 

Residence in Krems hat sie dieses 

Projekt vor Ort weitergeführt. Der 

Historiker Robert Streibel, der schon 

viele Jahre über die Zeit des 

Nationalsozialismus in Österreich und 

speziell auch in Krems forscht und 

gegen das Verschweigen arbeitet hat 

die Künstlerin, dabei sehr unterstützt 

und viele Informationen zu belasteten 

Orten in Krems und Umgebung 

gegeben. Diese heute von alltäglicher 

Normalität geprägten Orte hat 

Tapouchi fotografiert. So kann uns 

Geschichte verdammt nah kommen, 

die Schichten unter der Normalität, 

der Idylle können zum Vorschein 

kommen. Dazu bedarf es vielleicht 

keiner Gedenkstätte, keiner Plakette 

oder keines Stolpersteins. Sehr wohl 

aber kann durch solche Projekte das 

Bewusstsein für unsere Geschichte 

geschärft werden und die Bereitschaft, 

darüber nachzudenken und zu reden. 

Denn mehr noch durch das Sprechen 

als durch das Schreiben kann 

Geschichte, können Menschen und 

ihre Schicksale lebendig bleiben, das 

Schweigen der Orte gebrochen 

werden. 

So scheint es auch gut, dass wir uns 

dessen bewusst sind, dass die 

Kunstmeile Krems, dieser wunderbare 

Ort, wo Kunst vielfältig erlebbar wird, 

in seiner Geschichte auch ein Ort war, 

an dem Zwangsarbeit geleistet werden 

musste. 

Andreas Hoffer ist Kurator in der 

Kunsthalle Krems und von AIR - Artist 

in Residence. Hoffer, in Deutschland 

geboren, lebt seit 1989 in Wien und 

arbeitet dort als Kurator und 

Kulturvermittler.

11 

D 

er Turnertempel stand Ecke 

Turnergasse / Dingelstedtgasse 

im 15. Bezirk und wurde nach der 

Synagoge in der Seitenstättengasse und 

dem Leopoldstädter Tempel als dritte 

Synagoge Wiens erbaut. Er wurde in 

der Nacht vom 9. auf den 10. 

November 1938, in der 

„Reichskristallnacht“, völlig zerstört 

und niedergebrannt. Ein wertvolles 

Kulturgut, ein religiöser Ort wurde 

ausgelöscht, während Passanten und 

Nachbarn einfach zusahen und auch 

die Feuerwehr in den Brand nicht 

eingriff. 

„Unser Gotteshaus gilt denn auch als 

eines der gediegensten Tempelgebäude 

der Monarchie“ (Leopold Stern, 1892). 

Bereits 1869 war Adolf Schmiedl zum 

ersten Rabbiner der zu dieser Zeit von 

der IKG Wien unabhängigen 

Kultusgemeinde Sechshaus bestellt 

worden. Im selben Jahr erwarb man das 

Doppelgrundstück Turnergasse 22, 

Ecke Blüthengasse (heute 

Dingelstedtgasse), das im Zentrum der 

Gemeinde lag; 1870 beauftragte man 

den Wiener Architekten Carl König 

(1841-1915) mit der Planung des 

ersten Vorstadttempels nach dem 

Vorbild des Großen Leopoldstädter 

Tempels. 1872 wurde der knapp 830 

Plätze fassende Neorenaissancebau mit 

„pompejanischem“ (Leopold Stern) 

Innendekor fertiggestellt, 1923 durch 

eine Winterbetschule erweitert. 

Der Turnertempel war, nach dem heute 

einzigen erhaltenen, ältesten 

Stadttempel in der Seitenstettengasse 

und dem Tempel in der Tempelgasse 3, 

der dritte Synagogenbau Wiens und 

zugleich der erste in einer der damals 

noch nicht eingemeindeten Wiener 

Vorstädte. Einer der wichtigsten 

Chronisten der Zeit, Leopold Stern, ab 

1852 Kantor, Religionslehrer und 

Beamter der Fünfhauser jüdischen 

Gemeinde, beschrieb den Tempel Mitte 

der 1890er-Jahre als einen „auf drei 

Seiten freistehender Bau, welcher in 

den vornehmen Formen der 

italienischen Frührenaissance gehalten 

ist.“ Stern geht in seinen detailgenauen 

Betrachtungen auf die reich getäfelten 

Holzgalerien ein, auf das „aus 

geschnitztem Holze“ gestaltete 

„Allerheiligste“ nach dem Vorbild der 

römischen Triumphbogenarchitektur 

und auf die imposanten korinthischen 

Säulen, die „ein dreifach gegliedertes 

Hauptgesimse“ trugen, „über dem sich 

ein von Akroterien gekrönter Giebel 

erhebt“. 

Die Liegenschaft ging wenige Monate 

nach dem Brand auf dem Weg der 

„Arisierung“ in den Besitz eines 

Nachbarn, der Garagen und eine 

Tankstelle errichtete und eine 

Reparaturwerkstätte betrieb, über und 

gelangte, nachdem das 1947 

begonnenen Rückstellungsverfahren 

1950 mit einem Vergleich geendet 

hatte, 1973 schließlich in den Besitz 

der Gemeinde Wien, die hier von 1976 

bis 1979 eine Wohnhausanlage 

errichtete. Die Garagen wurden zu 

dieser Zeit abgerissen. Einzig der 

Umstand, dass das Wohngebäude aus 

bautechnischen Gründen etwas nach 

hinten versetzt wurde, „rettete“ den 

ehemaligen 

Synagogenplatz davor, wie 

alle anderen der 21 in der 

Reichspogromnacht 

zerstörten Wiener Tempel 

heute verbautes Wiener 

Wohnareal zu sein. 1988 

wurde zwar eine 

Gedenktafel angebracht, 

doch erst mit Verkauf des 

ehemaligen Vereinshauses 

in der Herklotzgasse 21 

und dem daran 

anschließenden Beginn 

der Forschungs- und 

Vermittlungsarbeiten 

konnte ein Prozess ins 

Leben gerufen werden, der 

am nun wieder öffentlich 

zugänglich gemachten 

Gedächtnisort seinen 

Höhepunkt findet. 

Dem Prozess der Suche 

nach einem adäquaten 

Erinnerungsortes gingen die 

Initiativen der Agentur 

dieloop und des Vereins 

coobra voran, sowie das Erkennen und 

Erforschen der bedeutenden jüdischen 

Vergangenheit des Bezirkes, als 

integralem Element des Lebens vor 

1938. Die Forschungstätigkeiten 

führten zu zahlreichen Interviews mit 

ehemaligen jüdischen Bewohner_innen 

des Bezirks, zu der Publikation „Das 

Dreieck meiner Kindheit“ im 

Mandelbaum Verlag und zur 

gleichnamigen Ausstellung im Haus 

Herklotzgasse 21, einem ehemaligen 

Zentrum des jüdischen Lebens im 

Bezirk. 

Im Jänner 2010 wurde von Kunst im 

öffentlichen Raum Wien in 

Kooperation mit der Stadt Wien ein 

zweistufiger Wettbewerb für die 

Gestaltung eines Mahnmals an der 

Stelle des zerstörten Turnertempels 

ausgelobt, zu dem fünf Teams aus 

Künstler_innen und 

Landschaftsgestalter_innen geladen 

wurden. 

Zielsetzung und Aufgabe des 

Wettbewerbs war es, an der Stelle des 

zerstörten Turnertempels einen 

zeitgemäßen Gedenk- und Symbolort 

zu schaffen. Zum einen sollte ein 

Gedächtnisort geschaffen werden, der 

von der Geschichte des Tempels und 

seiner Bedeutung für die jüdischen 

Bewohner der Gemeinde, aber auch 

von seiner Zerstörung und 

Verdrängung berichtet. Zum anderen 

sollte die Fläche wieder ein Ort der 

Begegnung, ein zugänglicher und 

nutzbarer Freiraum für die heutigen 

Bewohner des Bezirkes, werden. Der 

neu gestaltete Platz bildet eine 

Schnittstelle zwischen Vergangenheit 

und Zukunft. 

Als zentrales Element ihrer Gestaltung 

haben die Gewinner des Wettbewerbs 

Iris Andraschek und Hubert Lobnig 

gemeinsam mit Maria Auböck und 

János Kárász unter dem Titel 

„Turnertempel Erinnerungsort - Suche 

nach einer reflexiven Archäologie“ ein 

Netz aus dunklen Beton-Balken 

gewählt. Es symbolisiert in seiner 

abstrahierten Form den eingestürzten, 

zerborstenen Dachstuhl des 

Turnertempels nach dem Brand und 

erschließt zugleich in seiner 

„graphischen“ Anmutung den Platz, 

gliedert die Fläche, schafft Räume und 

dient als Möblierung. 

Die vorgefertigten Elemente, schließen 

teilweise mit dem Bodenniveau ab, 

ragen teilweise aus dem Boden, 

wachsen heraus. Der Platz bildet im 

Inneren Räume, Nischen, Zonen. Die 

Strukturierung holt die Menschen in 

den Platz hinein, hält sie im Platz, 

bietet ihnen Platz aber auch Abstand 

und Distanz. Die Betonbalken sind an 

der Oberfläche mit einer Holzmaserung 

strukturiert und nehmen das Bild des 

verbrannten, eingestürzten Dachbodens 

ÜBER DEN 

TURNERTEMPEL 

ERINNERUNGSORT 

Hubert Lobnig und Iris Andraschek 

auf. Zugleich sind sie Musterung, 

Markierung und Möblierung. 

Mosaikflecken bilden archäologische 

Fundstücke: Schon auf der Straße vor 

dem Betreten des Platzes beginnend, 

finden sie sich zwischen den Balken 

- Bilder im Boden, die zwischen 

tragischer Vergangenheit und 

zuversichtlicher Gegenwart vermitteln; 

auf ein lebendiges künftiges 

Miteinander von Menschen 

unterschiedlicher Religionen und 

Herkunft hinweisen. Gleichsam 

archäologische Fundstücke, die 

symbolträchtige Früchte. Granatäpfel, 

Feigen, Oliven, Datteln sind erkennbar, 

Überreste eines Festmahls vielleicht, 

aber auch eine Dose eines bekannten 

Energydrinks, Obst in einem 

Plastiksackerl oder Kerne in einem 

Becher. Es sind Früchte aus dem Süden, 

die in der Thora erwähnt werden und 

im jüdischen Jahreskreis eine Rolle 

spielen. Es sind aber auch Früchte, die 

den heute in der Umgebung 

wohnhaften Migranten aus ihrer 

Heimat vertraut sind und auch längst 

Eingang in den Speiseplan 

autochthoner Wiener gefunden haben. 

Der neu gestaltete Platz soll somit als 

Schnittstelle zwischen Vergangenheit 

und Zukunft erlebbar sein, in der 

sowohl die grausame Kraft von der 

Zerstörung des Tempels als auch die 

lebensbejahende Energie im Heute und 

in kommenden Zeiten 

angelegt sind. 

Andraschek und 

Lobnig entschieden 

sich, dem durch ihr 

Zitat der verkohlen 

Holzkonstruktionen 

einprägsamen Bild des 

zerstörten Tempels mit 

den intarsierten 

Mosaiken etwas 

Positives, Lebendiges 

entgegenzusetzen. „Wir 

sind dabei - angeregt 

von der 

pompejanischen 

Malereien in der 

Synagoge - von einem 

pompejanischen 

Mosaik ausgegangen, 

das den Namen „Der 

umgekehrte 

Küchenboden“ oder 

„Reste eines 

Festmahles“ trägt, und 

haben uns schließlich 

für Abbildungen von 

Früchten und Gemüsen entschieden, 

welche in der Tora erwähnt werden, 

aber auch für eine transkulturelle 

Gesellschaft von heute stehen.“ 

Der Erinnerungsort Turnertempel ist 

ein „neuer“ Gedenkort geworden. Im 

Gegensatz zu klassischen Denkmälern 

bietet er sich als Verweil- und 

Aufenthaltsort an, lädt ein, sich in seine 

Räumlichkeit, in seine Geschichte 

hinein zu begeben. Frontalität wird 

durch Involviertheit und Beteiligung 

ersetzt. Das funktioniert sehr gut. Die 

Menschen geben auf ihn acht. Von der 

Idee, ihn auch als Veranstaltungsort zu 

nutzen wurde außer den 

Gedenkveranstaltungen zur 

Reichsprogromnacht noch nicht 

wirklich Gebrauch gemacht, was gut 

ist. Es soll ein stiller, besinnlicher Ort 

für die individuelle Erfahrung von 

Geschichte und zugleich ein schöner 

und einladender Ort in der Stadt sein 

und bleiben. 

Auf einer Tafel im hinteren Bereich des 

Erinnerungsortes Turnertempel finden 

Besucher_innen Informationen über 

die Platzgestaltung, über die Geschichte 

des Turnertempels und den Brand von 

1938. Die Information ist bewusst der 

eigenen Wahrnehmung nachgereiht. 

Der Text enthält Textzitate aus „Es soll 

ein lebendiger Erinnerungsort sein“ von 

Angela Heide, dem Pressetext von 

KÖR, Kunst im öffentlichen Raum 

Wien, Erinnerungsort Turnertempel 

- Suche nach einer reflexiven 

Archäologie von Hubert Lobnig und 

Janos Karasz, und dem Artikel von 

„Betreten geboten“ von Franziska Leeb. 

Iris Andraschek 

Geboren 1963 in Horn. Studium an der 

Akademie der Bildenden Künste Wien. 

Ausbildung an der Freskoschule in Bozen 

und scuola degli arti ornamentali in 

Rom. Schwerpunkte der künstlerischen 

Arbeit sind Fotografie und Zeichnung, 

sowie ortsbezogene Projekte und 

Installationen im öffentlichen Raum (seit 

1997 oft gemeinsam mit Hubert Lobnig). 

Sie ist Mitglied der Wiener Secession und 

von Foto Fluss, erhielt zahlreiche Preise 

und Stipendien, lebt und arbeitet in 

Wien und Mödring (NÖ). 

Hubert Lobnig 

Geboren 1962 in Völkermarkt. Studium 

an der Hochschule für angewandte Kunst 

in Wien. Schwerpunkte der künstlerischen 

Arbeit sind Video, Zeichnung, Malerei, 

Fotografie sowie ortsbezogene Projekte 

und Installationen im öffentlichen Raum 

(seit 1997 oft gemeinsam mit Iris 

Andraschek). Zahlreiche kuratorische 

Projekte. Professur für künstlerische Praxis 

an der Kunstuniversität Linz. Lebt und 

arbeitet in Wien und Mödring (NÖ). 

Hubert Lobnig ist Mitglied der NGBK in 

Berlin und der Wiener Secession. 

Photo: Iris Andraschek

L I T E R A R Y S E C T I O N 

DIE 

TOTEN 

HABEN 

KEINEN 

HUNGER 

I STAND IN THE 

BOOTH 

15 MINUTES 

OF MY LIFETIME 

FOR AND AGAINST 

THE KILLING OF 

MILLIONS OF 

THEY WILL NOT 

FOLLOW YOU 

THE LIVING WILL 

THE ROTTEN ALIVE 

REMEMBERING 

THEIR GLIMPSE 

WHICH WAS GIVEN 

THE UPCOMING 

IS NOT TRYING TO 

DEFEND ANYTHING, 

NEITHER THE 

EXPLANATION OF 

THE PAST OR THE 

LOGIC IN THE 

THE PROLETARIAN 

WORKS BUT DOES 

NOT POSSESS 

AND DOES NOT 

CONDUCT THE 

CONDITIONS 

UNDER WHICH 

DO WE FOCUS ON 

THAT NARROW 

PERIOD OF TIME? 

DOES ANYONE 

FEEL ALIENATED 

BECAUSE (S)HE 

DOES NOT OWN THE 

MINUTES 

TO US. 

WORDS ITSELF. 

(S)HE WORKS? 

CONDITION THEY 

OF UNSEEN 

WORK FOR? 

Lars Dreiucker 

GLIMPSE 

THE DEAD 

ARE NOT HUNGRY 

WITH OPEN EYES 

THEY WAIT FOR THE 

LAST GLIMPSE. 

DEATH IS NOTHING 

NOT HAVING BEEN 

IS THE CRIME 

WHY WE ARE 

NOT THE DEAD 

ALTHOUGH WE ARE 

WAITING FOR THE 

SAME GLIMPSE? 

WHAT GLIMPSE 

ANYWAY? 

IF WE REMEMBER 

THE PLACES OF 

FORCED LABOUR 

CAMPS, WE DO NOT 

ONLY REMEMBER 

THE DEAD 

BUT ALSO THE 

IF WE AGREE ON 

THE FACT THAT 

ALL PEOPLE TODAY 

DON'T OWN THE 

CONDITIONS THEY 

WORK FOR AND 

HELP TO NOURISH 

ANSWER 

ME! 

INSTITUTION OF 

THOSE 

MARCHING IN THE 

ALIENATED WORK 

CONDITIONS, 

PERFECTLY SAFE 

FIELD OF ROTTEN 

GLORY 

THE DEAD ARE NOT 

AS SUCH. IS THAT 

NOT SO? ISN'T LIFE 

IF SO, WHY DO WE 

FOCUS ON THE 

TRIES TO FIGHT 

HUNGRY 

IN THE GIST OF 

TIME OF FORCED 

THE SEEN DEFEAT. 

WITH OPEN EYES 

THE MODERN 

LABOUR BETWEEN 

CHARTING 

THEY STORM OUR 

PRACTICE OF WAGE 

1933 AND 1945 

MANNER IN THE 

PAST AND NO 

LABOUR A DRAMA 

WITH A SPECIAL 

FORESEEABLE 

PICTURE HERE 

AS SUCH? 

AWARENESS? 

STORM 

BEGGING FOR 

IF ALL MODERN 

FOR GOLDEN 

FORGIVNESS. AS IF 

WAGE LABOUR IS 

CHAMBERS OR 

THERE WERE SUCH 

FORCED LABOUR 

FORGIVENESS. 

A THING. 

WHY DO WE FOCUS 

ON THAT NARROW 

PERIOD OF TIME? 

Lars Dreiucker is a philosopher, poet, 

screenwriter and curator. 

SCHICHTEN 

Bibliography 

Erwin Uhrmann 

I 

Ich zog nach wien 

vom land ohne 

recht zu wissen 

kramte in der tasche 

unausgeschlafen 

musste jeden tag den grünen 

platz 

queren unfrisiert 

über die fahle wiese 

vor den häusern 

mit eingezogenem kopf 

weil der wind dort fegt 

über die platten, 

die stadtkinder spielten 

oder kleinere ließen sich ziehen 

gelangweilt in ihren kinderwägen 

wie touristen im fiaker 

hunde, die ihren geruch verteilten 

auf den paar quadratmetern grün 

es stank 

in der hitze 

nach gummi und saurer erde 

mein hohlweg 

zwischen den grasflächen 

saß ich dann und wann am rand, aß 

pizza 

umstanden von 

betrunkenen 

die zitterten 

vor der dämmerung über dem 

betonierten fluss, 

in der nacht schrie man sich an 

oder fragte nach dem weg 

nebenan aber öffneten sich 

türen aus hellen räumen 

II 

In büchern am institut 

las ich 

von meinem grasplatz und dem 

hohlweg 

wo leute verhört 

500 am tag und abstransportiert oder 

eingesperrt 

von 900, die klebten in ihren sesseln 

mit spitzen zähnen 

und einsperrten, aburteilten 

von überall her ließ man 

die menschen kommen 

ein hauptquartier zum foltern 

der unschuldigen 

III 

Im herbst in connecticut 

lag ich im hotel und las von 

mark twain der dort lebte 

in hartford 

/und, dort erfuhr ich es, dass er auch/ 

in wien 

den kaiser gesehen 

dort abstieg 

im métropole 

/gebaut zur weltausstellung/ 

im métropole 

gegenüber wo die hellen räume 

sind 

mit freunden im beisl 

und in der nacht zum schlafen 

ins métropole 

wo später das terrorquartier 

wo später der grasplatz 

wo heute die stadt 

Erwin Uhrmann ist Schriftsteller und lebt 

in Wien. Zuletzt erschien von ihm der 

Gedichtband „Abglanz Rakete Nebel“. 

Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish 

(New York: Pantheon Books, 1977), p. 30 

Pierre Nora, Between Memory and 

History. Representations, no 26 (Spring 

1989), pp. 7–24, p. 9. 

James E. Young, The Texture of Memory: 

Holocaust Memorials and Meaning 

(New Haven: Yale University Press, 

1993). 

Nora, Between Memory and History, p. 9. 

William John Thomas Mitchell, “Holy 

Landscape”, in Larry Abramson (ed.), 

Holy Landscape. A Collection of Essays 

translated into Hebrew by Rona Cohen 

(Tel Aviv: Resling, 2009), p. 117. 

Robert Streibel: Die Stadt Krems im 

„Dritten Reich”. Alltagschronik 1938 - 

1945. Wien: Picus Verlag 1993. 

Nun Gute Nacht - Der vergessene 

Widerstand in Krems http://www. 

erinnern.at/bundeslaender/ 

niederoesterreich/bibliothek/dokumente/ 

nun-gute-nacht- der-vergessenewiderstand-in-krems 

Robert Streibel: April in Stein (Roman) 

Wien 2015. 

Robert Streibel: Krems 1938–1945. 

Eine Geschichte von Anpassung, Verrat 

und Widerstand. Verlag Bibliothek der 

Provinz, Weitra 2014. 

Hellmut Butterweck: Nationalsozialisten 

vor dem Volksgericht. Österreichs Ringen 

um Gerechtigkeit 1945-1955 in der 

zeitgenössischen öffentlichen 

Wahrnehmung. Innsbruck 2016. 

Robert Streibel: Aus der Verantwortung 

gestohlen. Wie verteidigen sich 

Nationalsozialisten nach 1945? In: 

Erinnerungsarbeit 1938/88 schulheft 

49/1988. 

Der letzte Akt. Noch zwei Tage vor der 

Kapitulation am 8. Mai 1945 wurde in 

Krems eine schaurige 

Gedenkveranstaltung für den toten Adolf 

Hitler inszeniert. Die Zeit 11.5.2015. 

Kremser Zeitung, 31.5.1956. 

Robert Streibel: „Plötzlich waren sie alle 

weg. Die Juden der “Gauhauptstadt 

Krems” und ihre Mitbürger.” Mit einem 

Vorwort von Erika Weinzierl und einem 

Beitrag von Gabriele Anderl. Wien: 

Picus Verlag. 2. Auflage 1992. 

Vgl. Gedenken und Mahnen in 

Niederösterreich Erinnerungszeichen zu 

Widerstand, Verfolgung, Exil und 

Befreiung. Heinz Arnberger / Claudia 

Kuretsidis-Haider (Hrsg.) Wien 2011. 

Anna Lambert: Du kannst im Leben vor 

nichts davonlaufen. Erinnerungen einer 

auf sich selbst gestellten Frau. 

STAY IN TOUCH 

AND GET FURTHER 

INFORMATION ABOUT 

ZIMZUM ISSUE II 

hadastapouchi.com 

Herausgegeben und mit einem Vorwort von 

Robert Streibel. Wien: Picus Verlag 1992. 

http://judeninkrems.at/denkmal-furanna-lambert/ 

Cf. Martin Pollack, Skażone krajobrazy 

[“Contaminated Landscapes”], Wołowiec 

2014. 

Karolina Przewrocka, Israel, Don’t 

Exclude Poland from Holocaust 

Reconciliation Process, http://www. 

haaretz.com/opinion/. 

premium-1.701978 

The debate itself has been thoroughly 

analysed by Piotr Forecki in his 

monograph “Spór o Jedwabne: analiza 

debaty publicznej” (“Wrangle over 

Jedwabne: An Analysis of the Public 

Debate”), which was published in 2008. 

The pogrom and its aftermath was also 

the topic of a phenomenal reportage book 

My z Jedwabnego (2004), written by 

Anna Bikont (it was translated to 

English as “The Crime and the Silence” 

in 2015). 

Yael Bartana, Nightmares (And Europe 

will be stunned, part 1), 2008. 

Franzobel: Österreich ist schön, 

Erschienen in : Franzobel: Luna Park, 

Zsolnay Verlag, Wien, 2003 

 

issue n o . ii

Zimzum Issue 1

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