Socialist Modernism in Central and Eastern Europe

Socialist Modernism in Central and Eastern Europe — Berlin, 2023

For the International Day of Monuments and Sites 2023, the Max Lingner Foundation and the German National Committee of ICOMOS convened a three-day workshop in Berlin on the heritage of the second socialist modernism, 1955 to 1990. Its starting point, in the words of the organisers, were the volumes published by Dumitru Rusu and B.A.C.U. Each of the three evenings was built around one of them, and the Socialist Modernism platform supplied the material on which the comparisons were made.

What the organisers wrote

The programme states that in Eastern Europe the contributions of Dumitru Rusu and the B.A.C.U. Association have had a remarkable resonance, and that through the photographic albums, the architectural guides and the Socialist Modernism website, the Romanian architect and his team have greatly advanced knowledge of the architecture of the former socialist countries. The volumes published up to that point, the Photo Album and Digital Architectural Guide series, were named as the starting point of the workshop.

The programme also records that a SocHeritage platform had been established within the framework of the ICOMOS International Scientific Committee on Twentieth Century Heritage, founded in Moscow in 2006.

The three evenings were built around the volumes: the Balkans and the Baltic States, the Russian Federation and Ukraine, and Germany. Each was followed by a discussion with specialists from the countries concerned, several of them joining online from cities then at war or close to it.

Programme

18 April

Coach excursion, Berlin post-war modernism, EASTWESTEAST, from Kino International. In the evening, welcome by Thomas Flierl (Max Lingner Foundation) and Tino Mager (ICOMOS Germany); Dumitru Rusu presented the Socialist Modernism project and the volumes on the Balkan region and the Baltic States. Discussion with Riin Alatalu (ICOMOS Europe, Tallinn), Kirsten Angermann (ICOMOS Germany, Weimar), Dora Ivanova (ICOMOS Germany, Sofia) and Danica Petrovic (Belgrade / BTU Cottbus); online, Emilia Kaleva and Aneta Vasileva (Sofia), Vaidas Petrulis (Vilnius), Sandra Uskokovic (Dubrovnik).

19 April

Walking tour of Pankow as East Berlin’s government district of the 1950s: Niederschönhausen Palace, Majakowskiring, the Intelligence Housing Estate, the Soviet Memorial at Schönholz. In the evening, Dumitru Rusu presented the volumes on Ukraine and Russia. Discussion with Anna Bronovitskaya (Moscow / Munich), Oxana Gourinovitch (Aachen / Berlin), Mikhail Il’chenko (Ekaterinburg / Leipzig), Pavlo Kravchuk (Zaporizhzhia), Yevheniia Molyar (Kyiv / Rome), Svitlana Smolenska (Kharkiv / Berlin); online, Natalya Dushkina (Moscow) and Vitaliy Shulyar (Lviv). Chaired by Jörg Haspel.

20 April

Coach excursion to Cottbus: the Stadthalle and the campus, and a meeting with the Emerging Professionals working group of ICOMOS and specialists at BTU Cottbus. In the evening, Dumitru Rusu presented the volume on Socialist Modernism in Germany, followed by the session “What is Socialist Modernism? On the state of the debate”. Discussion with Kirsten Angermann (Weimar), Johanna Blokker (Cottbus), Thomas Danzl (Munich), Oxana Gourinovitch (Aachen / Berlin), Dora Ivanova (Sofia / Berlin), Andreas Putz (Munich) and Christoph Rauhut (Berlin). Chaired by Thomas Flierl.

Organisers

Organised by the Max Lingner Foundation and ICOMOS Germany, in cooperation with BTU Cottbus, with the support of the Landesdenkmalamt Berlin, the Chair of Monument Preservation at BTU Cottbus-Senftenberg, Helle Panke, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation Berlin and the Hermann Henselmann Foundation. Venue: Max-Lingner-Haus, Beatrice-Zweig-Straße 2, Berlin.

Recording

The workshop was held in Berlin and online. It was streamed on the Socialist Modernism channel, with the agreement of the organisers, so that colleagues who could not travel — several of them speaking from or about countries then at war — could follow and take part.

The organisers published their own recordings of the three evenings, listed in the ICOMOS Germany report: 18 April, 19 April, 20 April.

Documents

In its report on the workshop, signed by Thomas Flierl and Jörg Haspel, ICOMOS Germany writes that using the Socialist Modernism platform and its visual material as a starting point for international comparison proved highly stimulating, and describes the photographic inventory of the period 1955–1991 as a cross-border participatory project that opens access to an unexpectedly diverse architectural heritage of Eastern Modernism. The report concludes that socialist modernism in Central and Eastern Europe can and must be established as a European research subject, and calls on ICOMOS, DOCOMOMO and Europa Nostra to drive it.

The workshop followed the two meetings of the ICOMOS ISC20C SocHeritage working group of 2015, in Sofia in August and in Berlin in September, at which the platform was proposed and agreed.