November 8, 1939 (memorial)
November 8, 1939 is the name of the Georg Elser monument in Munich in memory of the resistance fighter against National Socialism Georg Elser and his assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler in the Bürgerbräukeller . The monument is located on Georg-Elser-Platz in the Maxvorstadt district and is a facade installation from the genre of light art . It was designed by the Frankfurt artist Silke Wagner .
Commemorative event
On November 8, 1939, the carpenter Georg Elser carried out an assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler with a time bomb in the Bürgerbräukeller in Munich. The attack failed; Elser was arrested and murdered in the Dachau concentration camp shortly before the end of the Second World War .
Location and monument
Elser moved to Munich in the summer of 1939 to prepare for the assassination attempt. He rented a room in the Maxvorstadt district; the memorial is located in the immediate vicinity at the place named after Georg Elser.
The installation with a diameter of around five meters is attached to the facade of a primary school. The artist's aim was to "focus on the essentials - the assassination" ( Silke Wagner ). Elements made of aluminum and neon-lit glass form the lettering “8. November 1939 ". The elements are arranged in a circle so that the abstract representation of an explosion results. Every day at 9:20 p.m., the exact time of the detonation of the bomb in the Bürgerbräukeller, the individual letters of the installation light up one after the other until the entire lettering is illuminated. The light goes out again after just one minute.
history
Georg Elser only received full recognition as a resistance fighter late on. It was not until 1989 that a bronze plaque was inaugurated for him at the site of the attack in Munich. The square in Maxvorstadt was named Georg Elsers in 1997 - after persistent efforts by the Munich Georg Elser Initiative and the publicist Hella Schlumberger . The monument there is the winning design of a competition. His nomination sparked criticism, also from Schlumberger and the Mayor of Munich Christian Ude . Above all, the abstract representation and the - except for one minute a day - particularly inconspicuous appearance of the monument met with rejection.
The inauguration at the end of October 2009 was disrupted by members of the right-wing extremist scene who protested against Elser's act.
literature
- J. Stark: Every day at 9:20 pm. Light installation is reminiscent of the Hitler attack by Georg Elser 70 years ago . In: Münchner Wochenanzeiger , Volume 29, No. 44 of October 28, 2009, p. 1. Article on the web, accessed on October 30, 2009
- Franz Kotteder : Flash of light. Munich commemorates Georg Elser with a memorial . In Süddeutsche Zeitung volume 65, from October 29, 2009, p. 11. Article on the web ( Memento from November 2, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
Web links
- “I wanted to prevent the war”. The resistance fighter Georg Elser (1903–1945) . City of Munich, Cultural Department, Sabine Brantl. (PDF document; 541 kB).
- Georg Elser monument “8. November 1939 " . City of Munich, cultural department .
- Georg Elser Memorial in Munich on georg-elser-arbeitskreis.de. There u. a. also a video of the light show.
Individual evidence
- ↑ abendzeitung-muenchen.de - Elser Memorial: Neo-Nazis disrupt celebration of 29 October 2009, accessed on November 2, 2014
Coordinates: 48 ° 9 ′ 3.3 " N , 11 ° 34 ′ 36.1" E