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A monument to dismantlement
Christos Varvantakis
Goerlitzerstrasse 59, 10997 Berlin, Germany, cvarvantakis{at}yahoo.com
The Palast der Republik was the parliament building of the former German Democratic Republic and an entertainment center for its people. It is currently being dismantled in a lengthy procedure that will last for a period of three years. The extended `present' of the building's removal is the focus of this article, which examines the ways in which the building is becoming a memory as it de-materializes. Throughout the text, the monumental characteristics of the dismantlement and its physiognomy as a monument to temporality are taken into consideration.
Key Words: Berlin • corporeality • materiality • memory • nostalgia • temporality
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Memory Studies, Vol. 2, No. 1,
27-38 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1750698008097393
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