Freedom and Unity Monument

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Draft as of autumn 2014: night view, viewed from Schinkelplatz

The Freedom and Unity Monument is a monument under construction on the Freedom Palace in Berlin for the peaceful revolution and German reunification in 1989/1990, the establishment of which the Bundestag decided on November 9, 2007.

The design Citizens in Motion by the Stuttgart office Milla und Partner, chosen in a competition in 2011, is a walk-in bowl that slowly tilts as the visitors interact. The construction, also known as a single rocker, on the site of the Kaiser Wilhelm National Monument, which was demolished by the GDR leadership, was controversial in terms of location, symbolism, architecture, monument and nature conservation .

The start of construction planned for 2013 was delayed due to monument protection and environmental concerns as well as land and financing issues. After the budget committee of the Bundestag recommended a halt to implementation in April 2016, the Bundestag again decided to build it with a large majority in June 2017. The funds for construction were released in September 2018, and construction began on May 19, 2020.

Initiative and Bundestag resolution

The initiative for the planned memorial came from a small group of politicians, town planners and journalists. Shortly after the second competition for the Berlin Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe was completed, Florian Mausbach , Günter Nooke , Jürgen Engert and Lothar de Maizière started the “Monument to German Unity” initiative on May 13, 1998 by addressing the President of the Bundestag Rita Süssmuth , the Federal Chancellor Helmut Kohl , the Federal Council Chairman Gerhard Schröder and the Governing Mayor Eberhard Diepgen wrote a letter. A “citizen's monument” in a central location in Berlin is intended to honor the courage of individuals to oppose the state apparatus by “expressing the liberating joy that the fall of the Wall triggered - a monument to historical happiness and tears of joy”. At the same time, they started a signature campaign in which they were able to win over celebrities and association representatives. They suggested the base of the national monument as the location, as it lies between the Kronprinzenpalais - in which the Unification Treaty was signed - and the meeting place of the People's Chamber in the Palace of the Republic - which declared the GDR's accession to the Federal Republic there - and the place where the largest demonstration march of the peaceful revolution on November 4th, 1989.

In April 2000, a non-partisan motion by East German MPs brought the matter to the Bundestag for the first time, but was rejected in the Culture Committee. In 2005 the German Society resumed the project and began on November 9, 2006, among other things with hearings, to address decision-makers and multipliers and to bring the topic into the media. In 2007, the Federal Foundation for Reconstruction organized the first student competition for an artistic implementation of the monument. On November 9, 2007, the Bundestag decided to have the monument erected. The federal government was asked to design it in cooperation with the German Society. For their commitment, the initiators from 1998 and the German Society received the German National Prize on March 18, 2008 . After months of deliberations on the location issue ( Pariser Platz , Leipziger Platz , Alexanderplatz , Platz der Republik , Platz des 18. März , Lustgarten side of the Berlin Palace ), the original proposal for the freedom of the palace prevailed in its historical dialectic as an originally official symbol; the project was included in the federal memorial site concept in June 2008.

Competitions and planning

First competition

At the beginning of 2009, an open, two-stage competition was launched to design the monument. A jury was to select 20 participants from the anonymously submitted works to take part in the second stage. By then, 532 works from home and abroad had been received, including by Jonathan Borofsky , Gottfried Böhm , Axel Schultes , Rob Krier , Waldemar Otto and Graft Gesellschaft von Architekten . A 19-member jury met on April 27, 2009 for a jury meeting, in which no work received the absolute majority desired by the jury, whereupon they abandoned the competition.

In the press, statements by members of the jury could be heard that "a quarter of the designs" were "complete scrap"; the “naivety of many designs” is “devastating” and “shameful”. Representatives of the media, chambers of commerce and associations as well as members of the jury saw excellent proposals worth working out among the submitted work. Thomas Brussig , member of the jury, assigned responsibility for the failure of the jury itself. With around 30 seconds per work, this took too little time. Other critics were of the opinion that the decision, which is not required by competition law, to allow work in the first round only with an absolute majority for the second round, together with the size of the jury, led to failure. The participants were disappointed by the abandonment of the competition and the malice that was pouring in on them, and they pressed for a renewed examination of the quality of their work.

Second competition

A second competition was decided on July 1, 2009 in the Bundestag committee for culture and media. In addition to some works from the first competition, a committee should select around ten architects and artists for a second competition stage. In the new competition, the originally planned information center should be dispensed with and the content reduced to the events of the peaceful revolution in 1989.

The new process consisted of an international open applicant round followed by a restricted competition. 386 drafts were submitted for the open application process. An independent panel of experts selected the participants for the subsequent restricted competition. 28 artists took part in it. On October 3, 2010, Minister of State for Culture Bernd Neumann presented the results in Berlin. Three equal prizes and two recognitions were given. The three equal prizes went to Stephan Balkenhol , Andreas Meck and Milla & Partner in collaboration with Sasha Waltz . Xavier Veilhan received both recognitions in collaboration with BP architectures, Paris and realities: united (Jan and Tim Edler in collaboration with Bjarke Ingels Group, Copenhagen). From October 4 to 31, 2010, all 28 competition entries were exhibited in the Martin-Gropius-Bau with free admission.

The jury recommended that the three award-winning entries be revised. On April 13, 2011, the jury announced that, after the revisions, they had decided in favor of the design by Milla und Partner and the choreographer Sasha Waltz.

Winning design

The design “Citizens in Motion” by Milla partner Sebastian Letz is a walk-in shell 50 meters long, 700 square meters walkable area and 150 tons total weight. At its widest point, the bowl is 2.5 meters deep; it narrows towards the ends, which are gently sloping upwards. The bowl is placed on the largely preserved base of the earlier national monument. The core of the construction is a space structure made of steel. The slogans of the Monday demonstrators at the time of the fall of the Wall can be found on the top of the bowl, the surface of which is made of bound fine chippings: “ We are the people . We are one people . ”On the gilded underside, which is covered with light metal panels , there are pictures from the time of the turning point . The underside is illuminated from below at night; by means of steel nets that adapt to the movements of the shell, visitors are to be shielded from the mechanical processes on the underside.

The object goes beyond the traditional consideration of monuments; the planners speak of a social sculpture : it is conceived as a walk-in kinetic object, the appearance of which the visitors help to shape and which they actively acquire. They have to come to an understanding and decide to act together to make a difference: only when at least twenty more people come together on one half of the bowl than on the other does the bowl begin to tilt slowly and gently. The maximum deflection of the bowl of 1.5 meters in height difference is achieved by 50 more people at one end, up to 1400 people can be seated on the bowl. Four hydraulic rams under the shell slow down the movement. The monument does not contain any sensors or control technology, but floor heating for outside temperatures from five degrees Celsius downwards. The table-like construction on which the bowl rests is 50 m × 18 m wide and rests on seven deep bored piles with a diameter of 1.5 meters, which reach 40 meters underground through the historic monument base.

According to Johannes Milla, the design refers to the national monument that was previously at this point, as the visitors enter the bowl at the height in which Wilhelm I was on the equestrian statue of the former national monument . In addition, the contour of the bowl takes up the historical base, but separates from it. Due to the proximity to the German Historical Museum in the Zeughaus on the opposite side of the Spree Canal , detailed information boards should not be used. In addition to an information board, a website for the monument is planned. There are no plans to guard the monument.

Construction preparations and resistance

The Milla & Partner office developed the design until it was ready for construction at the end of 2013; The building permit was issued in October 2015 . Construction costs of around 17 million euros and annual operating and maintenance costs of around 200,000 euros are expected, including for underfloor heating.

In April 2016 the budget committee of the Bundestag decided in a closed session to stop the planning for the construction. This was justified with increased costs due to the resettlement of bats and the monument protection requirements for the historic vault in the base. Wolfgang Thierse warned that a committee should not casually change such an important decision of parliament. In the Council of Elders , Bundestag President Norbert Lammert (CDU) asked the parliamentary groups on September 29, 2016 to think about how to proceed. The decision of a committee cannot replace or revoke a decision in plenary.

Berlin Palace and National Monument , 1900

The budget committee provided 18.5 million euros in November 2016, not for the memorial but for the reconstruction of the colonnades of the Kaiser Wilhelm National Monument . An open letter signed by Thierse and former GDR civil rights activists to the budget and culture and media committee criticized this; the “sudden, largely undiscussed rededication” ignores the “significance of the monument project” and the resolution of the Bundestag. The square does not include the glorification of the empire, but a freedom monument that shows Germany's transition to democracy. The culture committee responded with a technical discussion on January 25, 2017, in which experts and representatives of civil society spoke in favor of the winning design and the location.

On February 14, 2017, the government factions ( CDU / CSU and SPD ) announced that they would have the monument erected. Two days earlier, Bundestag President Norbert Lammert (CDU), in his speech on the election of the Federal President, demanded that the monument should finally be realized. On the evening of June 1, 2017, the plenum decided with the votes of the government factions together with the Greens and against the votes of the left-wing faction to build the monument in front of the castle according to the design by Milla and Partners. It was originally supposed to begin before the 2017 federal election and inaugurated on November 9, 2019, on the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall . In the coalition agreement of February 2018, the CDU / CSU and SPD reaffirmed their will to build the monument.

Planning was delayed due to unclear land and financing issues. In April 2018, the state of Berlin announced that it would sell the building plot to the federal government for a symbolic price, which was criticized by the building policy spokeswoman for the SPD parliamentary group, Iris Spranger , because the House of Representatives does not have to agree to a sale price of less than three million euros. The Senate had given away an “exclusive property” past parliament. The property was transferred to the federal government on August 22, 2018. Grütters stated that all building requirements were met; In addition to the transfer of the property, the planned ramp for the disabled has been extended, the architectural office Milla und Partner has been won as a client, and the bats have relocated to the Plänterwald . In September 2018, a report by the Berlin Monument Office spoke out against the extension of the building permit, because during construction seven 40-meter-long concrete piles to secure the building site were driven into the swampy subsoil through the base and the restored mosaics of the former national monument would not be re-attached there should. Nevertheless, the building permit was extended to October 2019 at the end of September. On September 27, 2018, the budget committee released the funds for the construction of the monument, which politicians from the government factions welcomed, but politicians from the FDP and the Left Party and the Berlin Historic Center Association criticized.

Because the construction work on the Humboldt Forum and the Museumsinsel underground station have priority, the start of construction was delayed in early 2019, so that completion on the 30th anniversary of German unity in October 2020, which Grütters had aimed for, was unlikely. The planning office Milla und Partner is assuming a construction time of at least two years. In May 2019, the director Christoph Lauenstein accused that the unitary monument plagiarized the idea of ​​his short film Balance , published in 1989 , which the planning office Milla und Partner rejected. Because of protected bats that winter in the underground part of the national monument, the start of construction was delayed further in autumn 2019 to spring 2020 at the earliest. The building permit was extended by one year to October 2020. The Senate Department for the Environment, Transport and Climate Protection granted an exemption for the construction, but at the same time demanded compliance with strict nature and species protection requirements, which are expected to increase the cost of the project by several million euros. At the end of October 2019, the Berlin State Association of the Nature Conservation Union filed a complaint with suspensive effect against the exception notice; At the beginning of November 2019, the Berlin environmental administration lifted this. According to the Naturschutzbund, construction work will not start before May 2020.

Alternative suggestions

In August 2017, the Berlin state curator Jörg Haspel suggested that the monument base and its preserved floor mosaics be preserved, something that protesters from the Berliner Historische Mitte association also regularly demand. As an alternative location, the association initially introduced the space between the Federal Chancellery and the Paul-Löbe-Haus in the band of the federal government , where the citizens' forum was originally intended. In the summer of 2018, the members of the Bundestag Hartmut Ebbing ( FDP ) and Eva Högl ( SPD ) as well as Annette Ahme , the chairwoman of the association, spoke out in favor of erecting the monument on the Republic Square in front of the Reichstag building. In July 2018, cultural and media workers called on the Bundestag in an open letter to erect the monument in the vicinity of the Reichstag building. The location in front of the city palace “ puts existential questioning the cosmopolitan content and aspirations of the Humboldt Forum .” The signatories include Christian Thielemann , Lea Rosh , Goerd Peschken , Wilhelm Wieben , Dagmar Berghoff , Hans Wall and Berlin state politicians. The monument planner Johannes Milla described it as "historical nonsense" to erect the monument in the west of Berlin, since the citizens of the GDR who rebelled against the SED regime should be honored with it. Günter Nooke pointed out that the construction in a different location violated the copyright of the artists.

In March 2018, the art historian Peter Stephan suggested that the historic colonnade designed by the architect Gustav Halmhuber should be reconstructed as a structural link between the palace and the Museum Island instead of the “unit rocker” and that it should be dedicated as a freedom monument for the democratic revolutions of 1848 and 1989 . Like the Budget Committee in 2016, the AfD parliamentary group in the German Bundestag supported the reconstruction of the colonnades in 2018. The cultural policy spokesman Marc Jongen called for a new tender for monument planning for another location.

In April 2018, the historian Martin Sabrow spoke out against a specially erected unitary monument, since the Brandenburg Gate is available as a place of remembrance , which, like no other place, testifies to the merciless force of the division and its "happy and peaceful overcoming".

reception

The conceptual design of the monument was criticized even before the realization competition was concluded. Some observers consider the amalgamation of the terms freedom and unity problematic, since the reform forces of autumn 1989 would not have unanimously supported the demand for the unification of the two German states. Therefore politicians of the Left Party have turned against the draft. Doubts about the inscription “ We are the people ” also arose from 2014 in the wake of increased nationalist currents such as Pegida , who used this slogan. The art historian Martin Schönfeld sees the - CDU- dominated - monument initiators in a deliberate competition to the "negative memory" that has shaped the remembrance culture of the Federal Republic since the 1980s, to which they opposed a positive identification offer and at the same time the traditional concept of the monument restored with base. Schönfeld sees this as an expression of a “neo-conservative transformation” of Berlin into a “normal capital” with national places of representation. On the other hand, the SPD member of the Bundestag Hiltrud Lotze considers the rededication of the site by the monument to be "impressive", since the palace forecourt with its references to the March Revolution in 1848, through the November Revolution in 1918 to the peaceful revolution in the GDR in 1989 with demonstrations in front of the Palace of the Republic, German democracy history wrote. The journalist Hajo Schumacher criticized the "protest out of pure panic for change"; Building the monument in its controversial, new form is “a powerful symbol of departure, for new things, for the unknown and, yes, also for a portion of madness”. The GDR historian Stefan Wolle suspected that the monument, once built, would prove to be popular, which is already suggested by the widespread designation as a “unit rocker”.

The winning design of the movable bowl met with rejection in the feature sections, but also in the population. The art historian Gabi Dolff-Bonekämper saw as pioneers of the monument older East German politicians who, like the opponents, were affected by the debate “in their innermost being, in their relationship to history, the city, the state and themselves”. The bowl, “perhaps a bit too loose and silly”, offers “nothing that points to the mere experience of movement”, which is “understood as a programmatic renunciation of pathos, almost sympathetic again”. Due to the decontextualized inscription, however, it becomes unclear who the monument actually honors - possibly the East Germans alone. Jens Bisky criticized the “democracy playground”; Anyone who has had the real experience of division and unification is reluctant to be "fooled or wobbled by political kitsch". Ulf Poschardt described the design as "a kind of concrete symbol inflection, for which no metaphor seems too simple". The trivialization of the coup as a kind of overturning by a playful herd instinct is reminiscent of the “arts and crafts parcours of church days”. Rainer Haubrich spoke of a "popular educational fairground attraction" and mentioned the nicknames "fruit bowl" and "federal banana". Andreas Kilb saw in the draft a reminiscence of the old Federal Republic in the clear world order of the Cold War , which knew nothing of the current threats of international terrorism and national isolation; the bowl stands for "the free flow of individuals" who join together to form collectives as the mood takes them. However, the Bundestag vote in June 2017 after the faction was compulsory thwarted the idea of ​​freedom. The historian Martin Sabrow rejected the monument “with its we motto, with its homage to the all-important majority principle and with its contaminated location” because it creates a “fatal” political and cultural line of sight.

According to a representative survey by Infratest dimap published in May 2017, when asked how they liked the winning design, 29% of Berliners said it was "very good" or "good", while 49% said they liked the walk-in bowl on Schlossplatz "less well" or “not at all”, while approval and disagreement each made up 33% of all German citizens. 16% of the Germans surveyed were in favor of the "unity seesaw", 43% against the rebuilding of the colonnades of the Kaiser Wilhelm monument that had previously stood at this point (Berliners: 18 to 58%). In a representative survey in 2018, almost 80% of Leipzig's and 70% of German citizens spoke out in favor of the planned Leipzig unified monument, the realization of which is completely unclear. Even William of Boddiens Förderverein Berliner Schloss and society Historical Berlin have spoken out against the Berlin design. In October 2017, representatives of the Berlin Academy of the Arts and Senator for Culture Klaus Lederer ( Die Linke ) spoke out against the draft Citizens in Motion and appealed to the newly elected 19th German Bundestag to revise the decision.

In 2018, Tagesspiegel spoke of an “unprecedented back and forth” in monument planning. For example, Minister of State for Culture Grütters doubted whether the Germans “are also capable of being monuments with a view to memories that create identity in a positive sense”; the architecture critic Niklas Maak even considered German society to be incapable of commemorating important events appropriately - as a non-representational metaphor, the unit seesaw is “the most crooked picture of all time”. Maak also pointed out that with the Brandenburg Gate there is already a unified monument. The rocker, in conjunction with the lock, leads to a "veritable symbol frame".

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Construction of the Berlin unified monument begins
  2. ^ German Bundestag, 16th electoral term: recommendation for resolutions and report by the Committee on Culture and Media. November 7, 2007, BT-Drs. 16/6974 .
  3. ↑ The idea. And: the debate. In: Freedom and Unity Monument ; Andreas H. Apelt: The Freedom and Unity Monument - on the history of an idea , July 11, 2011 (PDF) .
  4. ^ "Complete scrap": Competition for a single monument. In: Die Welt , April 28, 2009.
  5. ↑ Thomas Brussig: "Not the artists, we have failed". In: Der Tagesspiegel , May 8, 2009.
  6. ↑ Jann Kern (author): Call of the participants. June 16, 2009.
  7. ^ German Bundestag, Committee on Culture and Media: 82nd meeting; Martin Schönfeld: An opposite pole in the politics of memory. The planned “Freedom and Unity Monument” in Berlin. In: Contemporary historical research . Volume 6, 2009, Issue 1, pp. 129-139.
  8. ↑ You should be three winners. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , October 3, 2010; Peter von Becker : Three drafts in the final selection. In: Der Tagesspiegel , October 4, 2010.
  9. ↑ The unified monument will be a swing. In: Der Tagesspiegel , April 14, 2011.
  10. ^ Milla und Partner: Brief Concept: National Freedom and Unity Monument in Berlin. In: Freedom and Unity Monument (PDF) ; Happy ending for giant scales. In: EVB BauPunkt active. No. 2, 2017, p. 8 f. (PDF) ; Reinhart Bünger: The monument won't be finished for the anniversary. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 11, 2019.
  11. ^ Milla und Partner: Brief Concept: National Freedom and Unity Monument in Berlin. In: Freedom and Unity Monument (PDF) ; Reinhart Bünger: The monument won't be finished for the anniversary. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 11, 2019.
  12. ↑ The winning design. Website of the German Society, accessed on August 8, 2016; Giant seesaw is to remind of reunification. In: Zeit Online , April 13, 2011; Tim Schleider: The Stuttgart office is building the unified monument. In: Stuttgarter Zeitung , February 23, 2017; Happy ending for giant scales. In: EVB BauPunkt active. No. 2, 2017, p. 8 f. (PDF) .
  13. ↑ Reinhart Bünger: Monument will not be finished for the anniversary. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 11, 2019.
  14. ↑ Maritta Adam-Tkalec: Interview on the unitary monument: “It should be a place in the middle, definitely in the east”. In: Berliner Zeitung , July 30, 2018.
  15. ↑ Reinhart Bünger: Monument will not be finished for the anniversary. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 11, 2019.
  16. ↑ Tim Schleider: Unity without a monument - a monument without a unit. In: Stuttgarter Zeitung , September 14, 2018.
  17. ↑ Reinhart Bünger: High operating costs for the standard rocker. In: Der Tagesspiegel , July 2, 2018; Johannes Milla designed the “unified scale”. In: Landesschau Baden-Württemberg , March 6, 2017.
  18. ^ Minister of State for Culture Grütters on the Freedom and Unity Monument. Press release. Federal Government website, April 13, 2016; Berlin remains without a Freedom and Unity Monument. In: art in berlin , April 14, 2016.
  19. ↑ Bats sabotage large seesaw. In: Der Tagesspiegel , April 22, 2017.
  20. ↑ New start for the rocker. In: Tagesschau.de , June 15, 2016.
  21. ↑ Dirk Jericho: Bundestag President Lammert calls for a Bundestag resolution on the single seesaw. In: Berliner Woche , October 11, 2016.
  22. ↑ a b Peter Wensierski : Long live the emperor. In: Spiegel Online , November 26, 2016.
  23. ↑ Bund wants colonnades instead of the unified monument. In: Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg , November 26, 2016; Jens Bisky : The base of Wilhelminism - “Castle Colonnades” instead of a single monument. An absurd idea from the Budget Committee. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , January 12, 2017; Andreas Kilb : Commentary on the unified monument: seesaw becomes scales. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , January 25, 2017.
  24. ↑ Today in Bundestag No. 049: January 25, 2017. In: Schattenblick , January 28, 2017.
  25. ↑ The unified monument will now bob. In: Der Tagesspiegel , February 14, 2017.
  26. ↑ a b c Christiane Peitz: Unity monument in Berlin: Bundestag blesses the seesaw. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 2, 2017.
  27. ^ Nada Weigelt: Grand Coalition: Strengthening Culture in the Regions. In: Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung , February 9, 2018.
  28. ↑ Nada Weigelt: Planning of the "unit rocker" faltered again. In: Der Tagesspiegel , April 2, 2018.
  29. ↑ Berlin sells land for a single monument to the federal government. In: RBB24.de , April 13, 2018.
  30. ↑ The land for the uniform monument in Berlin now belongs to the federal government. In: Der Tagesspiegel , August 22, 2018; Martin Klesmann: Ex-GDR politicians are calling for construction to begin on the unified monument . In: Berliner Zeitung , August 24, 2018.
  31. ↑ Fatina Keilani: Grütters wants construction to start on the unified monument in autumn. In: Der Tagesspiegel , September 2, 2018.
  32. ↑ Expert opinion calls into question the unified monument. In: Der Tagesspiegel , September 10, 2018.
  33. ↑ Building permit extended: single rocker on the move again. In: Berliner Zeitung , September 23, 2018.
  34. ↑ 17 million euros: funds released for a single monument. In: Berliner Zeitung , September 27, 2018.
  35. ↑ Rüdiger Schaper: Berliner Einheitsdenkmal will probably be finished later. In: Der Tagesspiegel , January 15, 2019.
  36. ↑ Ralf Schönball: Plagiarism allegation against developer of the unit rocker. In: Der Tagesspiegel , May 10, 2019; Maritta Adam-Tkalec: Unified seesaw filmmaker accuses creators of plagiarizing his idea. In: Berliner Zeitung , May 11, 2019.
  37. ↑ Frank Bachner: Construction of the uniform seesaw will start in spring 2020 at the earliest. In: Der Tagesspiegel , September 20, 2019.
  38. ↑ Thomas Loy: Bats make unit monuments more expensive. In: Der Tagesspiegel , October 5, 2019.
  39. ↑ Construction of the “unit rocker” cannot start until spring 2020. In: RBB24.de , November 6, 2019.
  40. ↑ Now they are demonstrating for the base. In: Der Tagesspiegel , August 12, 2017.
  41. ↑ Reinhart Bünger: The dispute about the location of the unit seesaw is now just embarrassing. In: Der Tagesspiegel , May 19, 2018; Ralf Schönball: Unity seesaw in front of the Reichstag? In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 8, 2018.
  42. ^ Open letter: Conductor Thielemann against unit rocker. In: Welt Online , July 28, 2018.
  43. ↑ Maritta Adam-Tkalec: Interview on the unitary monument: “It should be a place in the middle, definitely in the east”. In: Berliner Zeitung , July 30, 2018. See also the article by one of the initiators, Andreas H. Apelt: Why the unity monument belongs to the Berlin freedom of the palace. In: Der Tagesspiegel , June 29, 2018.
  44. ↑ Anja Maier : Memorial for the reunification: no unity around the seesaw. In: Die Tageszeitung , August 3, 2018.
  45. ↑ Peter Stephan: Virchow Colonnades instead of Wilhelm Monument. A new option for the Berlin Palace Freedom. In: Journal of the Baukammer Berlin. Issue 1/2018, pp. 17–33 (PDF) .
  46. ↑ a b Vladimir Balzer: Nesting place instead of a single monument. In: Deutschlandfunk , October 22, 2019.
  47. ↑ Maritta Adam-Tkalec: Historians on memory - "The GDR has hardly any immediate significance". In: Berliner Zeitung , April 13, 2018.
  48. ↑ Detlef Kannapin: What freedom? Which unit? The project of the Freedom and Unity Monument. In: Jan Korte , Gerd Wiegel (ed.): Visible signs. The new German historical policy - from the perpetrator story to the victim's memory (=  New Small Library. Volume 146). PapyRossa, Cologne 2009, pp. 49–63.
  49. ↑ Joachim Fahrun: Why the left wants to prevent the unified monument. In: Berliner Morgenpost , April 24, 2017.
  50. ^ Anna Saunders: Memorializing the GDR: Monuments and Memory after 1989. Berghahn, New York, Oxford 2018, p. 268 .
  51. ↑ Martin Schönfeld: A counterpole in the politics of memory. The planned “Freedom and Unity Monument” in Berlin. In: Contemporary historical research . Volume 6, 2009, Issue 1, pp. 129-139. On “negative memory” for example Volkhard Knigge: On the future of memory. In: Dossier History and Remembrance , Federal Agency for Civic Education , June 21, 2010.
  52. ↑ Hajo Schumacher: The unitary monument is good because the wrong people are against it. In: Berliner Morgenpost , June 5, 2017.
  53. ↑ Gabi Dolff-Bonekämper: Debate about a unified monument: Put the seesaw away! In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , May 9, 2017.
  54. ↑ Jens Bisky: Unity Monument: It just doesn't bob. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , October 1, 2015.
  55. ↑ Ulf Poschardt: How did we deserve this monument? In: Die Welt , February 19, 2017.
  56. ↑ a b Rainer Haubrich: Only 16 percent of citizens want the single seesaw. In: Welt Online , May 28, 2017.
  57. ↑ Andreas Kilb: Discussion about “unity seesaw”: Is it the nation's fun mark? In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , June 4, 2017.
  58. ↑ Maritta Adam-Tkalec: Historians on memory - "The GDR has hardly any immediate significance". In: Berliner Zeitung , April 13, 2018.
  59. ↑ Reinhart Bünger: High operating costs for the standard rocker. In: Der Tagesspiegel , July 2, 2018.
  60. ^ Claudia van Laak : Cultural buildings in Berlin: tilting the unit seesaw. In: Deutschlandfunk , October 18, 2017.
  61. ↑ The land for the uniform monument in Berlin now belongs to the federal government. In: Der Tagesspiegel , August 22, 2018. For Grütters Ralf Bosen: New momentum for a German unified monument? In: Deutschlandfunk , August 21, 2018. For Maak Hans von Trotha: Thoughts on commemoration. In: Deutschlandfunk , August 20, 2018 (quote in the original article ).
Buildings of the Berlin Schloßplatz


Existing

Dom  • Liebknecht Bridge  • Lustgarten  • stables  • Rathausbrücke  • Schleusenbrücke  • Schloßbrücke  • Staatsratsgebäude

Former

Eagle Column  • Humboldt Box  • Kaiser Wilhelm National Monument  • Neptune Fountain  • Prince of Orange  • Palace of the Republic  • Equestrian statue of the Great Elector  • Equestrian statue of Friedrich Wilhelm III.  • Horse tamer  • Lock  • Freedom of lock

Under construction

Humboldt Forum

Coordinates: 52 ° 30 ′ 59 ″  N , 13 ° 24 ′ 0 ″  E