A Tribute to the late Ignatz Bubis
In Memoriam Ignatz Bubis
Please enter here
The Project
The Venues
The Patronage
Exhibition components
A Memorial As A Process
Documents
A Living Memorial 1995-1998
Memorial Project
Against the Forgetting, Racism, Xenophobia and Antisemitism
is a media art context dedicated to the victims of Holocaust realised between 1993 and 1999, launched on 27.1.1995 at the Historical Archives of the City of Cologne, created by the Cologne based media artist Agricola de Cologne, who had at that time still the name W.O.F. Agricola.
Standing under the Patronage of Ignatz Bubis (1927-1999), this memorial project was trying to draw a connection between the historical Nazism 1933-1945 and the neo-fascist manifestation of the days when this project was realised in the 90#ies of 20th century. Not only in Germany, but all over Europe there were daily neo-fascist demonstrations at many places.
This memorial site would not only like to reconstruct this project, which was destroyed in parts due to right-wing vandalism in 1998, but also spotlight this era which reminds a lot of these days in 2014-2015, when political right-wing parties get again a very dangerous relevance, and anti-Semitic and anti-Judaistic movements become visible like during the #90ies when this project was destroyed.
The project and its realisation is unthinkable without the most influencing historical incident of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the co-incidential establishment of the charitable society ARCHA and the Night of Broken Glass at the same day, 9th November 1989.
The Fall of the Berlin Wall was the start of the collaps of the Communist systems in the East of Europe and the reason, why the establishment of ARCHA Society with its President Wilfried Agricola de Cologne aka W.O.F. Agricola and its conceptual direction for a cultural exchange between Western and Eastern European countries, and the connection to the Night of broken Glass as the symolical starting point of the Holocaust became most relevant, because as the president of ARCHA and as such also an an artist, due to the open boarders to the East, Agricola de Cologne was – while visiting the memorial sites documenting Gernman barbarism on Polish ground in form of Auschwitz, Majdanek, Stutthof etc – for the first time really confronted directly with the Holocaust.
It was interesting for him to learn, that the Fall of the Berlin Wall had been saved the State run memorial sites in Poland, because there had been plans to close all memorial sites in near future for sure. But Agricola de Cologne was not visiting these sites as a “normal ” tourist, but as an invited guest by State Auschwitz Museum and State Majdanek Museum in Lublin, and as such a guest, he was spending in Auschwitz zwo nights, and in Majdanek much more nights because he was visiting Majdanek several times.
Being confronted with that part of the German history on Polish ground aimed to exterminate not only the Jews as a people, but also the Slavonic people like the Polish or the Russians, because from the “Arian”, respectively Nazi point of view they were subhuman creatures, whose purpose was to serve as slaves or to be exterminated.
Becoming aware of the dimension of inhumanity had a lasting shocking effect combined with the immediate desire to start working on an artistic contribution for the reconciliation with the Jewish and Polish people – A Living Memorial – the project which has a revival these days, because history seems to be repeating itself.
A Living Memorial 1995-1998
1000 Years, 50 Years and Still so Terribly Young
is a media art project created, operated and organised by Wilfried Agricola de Cologne between 1993 and 1998.
Concept, realisation, coordination & reconstruction
copryright © 1993-2016 by Wilfried Agricola de Cologne aka W.O.F. Agricola
All texts, images, logos and any media component
copyright 1995-2016 © by Wilfried Agricola de Cologne aka WOF Agricola
The printed catalogue was realised in collaboration between Majdanek State Museum Lublin, Muzeum Okregowe Bialystok, Muzeum Okregowe Siedlce, State Museum Stutthof, Museum Okregowe Sandomierz, Auschwitz State Museum, Historical Museum of City of Krakow, City Art Gallery Czestochowa, Katowice Silesian Museum
The project was realised with following collaborating institutions
Historisches Archiv der Stadt Köln , State Museum Majdanek Lublin, Muzeum Okregowe Bialystok, Muzeum Okregowe Siedlce, Staatl Museum Stutthof, Museum Okregowe Sandomierz , Staatl. Museum Auschwitz, Historisches Museum Krakau, Städtische Galerie Czestochowa, Schlesisches Museum Katowice, Städt. Galerie Zgorgelec, Landtag Thüringen Erfurt, Gedenkstätte Wöbbelin, Dokumentationszentrum des Bürgerkomittees Magdeburg, Schalomhaus Schönebeck, VHS Hannover, Schlossmuseum Sondershausen, Synagoge Affaltrach, Synagoge Michelbach/Lücke, Städt. Museum Salzwedel, Auschwitz Foundation Brüssel, Altes Rathaus Potsdam, Universitätsmuseum Halle/S, HATIKVA Dresden, Stadtarchiv Leipzig, Völkerschlachtdenkmal Leipzig, Historisches Museum Leipzig, Alte Nikolai Schule Leipzig, Galerie im Hörsaalbau Universität Leipzig, Gedenkstätte Dachau, Gedenkstätte Theresienstadt, Gedenkstätte Breitenau, Antoniterkirche Köln, Medienbibliothek Köln, Gedenkstätte Neuengamme Hamburg, Gedenkstätte Köpenicker Blutwoche Berlin, Synagoge Wittlich, Städt. Galerie Gladbeck, Salvatorkirche Duisburg, Synagoge Urspringen, Landtag Nordrhein-Westfalen
supported by
Cultural Department of the City of Cologne
Socitey for Christian-Jewish Collaboration Cologne
Society for Christian-Jewish Collaboration Hannover
German Embassy Warsaw
Ministery of the Interior Sachen-Anhalt
Ministery of the Interior Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
Ministery of Culture Niedersachsen
Cultural Department of the City of Potsdam
Cultural Foundation Leipzig
Leipzig Historical Museum
Leipzig University
University of Halle-Wittenberg
State Central for Political Education Sachsen-Anhalt
State Central for Political Education Hessen
State Central for Political Education NRW
Cultural Department of the City of Gladbeck
Sponsored by
Photo Sander Cologne
Karthäuser & Breuer Gmbh Cologne
KAPA GMBH Osnabrueck
Alternloh, Brinck & Co, Ennepetal
August vormann GMBH, Ennepetal
ELBA Bürosysteme Wuppertal