Collective Excavation Workshop Revisits “Nachgegraben”

In June 2024, the PhD student realised the installation The Dig in front of the Gropius Bau in Berlin as part of the art programme ‘Radical Playgrounds’ together with the platform The School of Mutants in the post-digital participation project Graben. The work was a direct reference to the 1985 excavation campaign ‘1933-1945 Nachgegraben’ (1933-1945 Dug Up) and recalled the invisible colonial history at the site of the former Museum für Völkerkunde.

This intervention became the starting point for a joint project by the Active Museum, the Berlin History Workshop and the Topography of Terror Foundation. To mark the 40th anniversary of the ‘Nachgegraben’ campaign, an online exhibition is being created that identifies those involved, documents their memories and opens up new perspectives on political practices of remembrance in the 1980s. Reference is also made to the installation ‘The Dig’ from 2024 on the homepage of the online exhibition: https://www.nachgegraben.berlin/de/über