11/09 Monday: 3pm
“A Hitchhiker's Guide to East German Television”
Dr. Henning Wrage (Humboldt University, Berlin)
Dr. Henning Wrage studied German literature and philosophy at the Humboldt University in Berlin. He worked as a research associate and assistant professor at the Freie Universität Berlin and at the Humboldt University in Berlin. He received his PhD in November 2007 with a study on comparative media history of the GDR in the early 1960s. Since 2009 he is the Humboldt Foundations Feodor Lynen-Fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
11/10 Tuesday: 3:30pm
“On the Verge: Witnessing the Decline of the Soviet Art Doctrine”
Masha Ryskin (Visual Artist)
Masha Ryskin is a visual artist who emigrated from the Soviet Union in 1989. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. She has worked and conducted workshops in the United States as well as Norway, Finland, Indonesia, France, Costa Rica, and Spain. She is a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design and is currently teaching at Roberts Wesleyan College in Rochester, NY.
11/11 Wednesday: 3:30pm
Panel Discussion:
20 Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall:
Culture, Memory,
and Politics in 2009.
With UConn faculty members Anke Finger and Friedemann Weidauer (Modern and Classical Languages), Charles Lansing (History), William Berentsen (Geology), and Henry Krisch (Political Science, Emeritus).
All participants will present short position papers to relate personal as well as professional experiences and findings about the significance of this important anniversary, to be followed by discussion.
Film Screenings:
11/11 Wednesday: 7-9 pm
Schaut auf diese Stadt / Look at this City (1962)
Director Karl Gass begins his film before the construction of the Wall. With montages of rare authentic images, Look at this City was intended to prove how important and necessary the closing of the border was for the preservation of the GDR. The director provided an account of the political, social and ecological development from a communist perspective: the Eastern section of Berlin was portrayed as a city of peace, while the West was portrayed as a "front" city and "spearhead against the East." The source of constant disruptions, West Berlin could only be resisted by forcefully isolating it. The film argued that the GDR, with the creation of the Wall, would be able to secure the possibility of peace in Europe and throughout the world. (DEFA Film Library)
11/12 Thursday: 7-9 pm
The Wall / Die Mauer (1989/90)
A poetic and enigmatic documentary from painter and filmmaker Jürgen Böttcher, who relies on sight and sound to contemplate the Berlin Wall’s historic and symbolic significance. This masterpiece, shot by the renowned director of cinematography, Thomas Plenert, reflects the soul of Berlin, both in the past and as the Wall came down. (DEFA Film Library)
Exhibition: October through November
Material Cultures:
The Everyday German Democratic Republic on Display
Contains everyday artifacts and art objects from before and after 1989/1990. Plaza Level, Babbidge Library