Leerstellen.Ausstellen
Leere Vitrinen?
© Humboldt Forum im Berliner Schloss/ Photo: Alexander Schippel
Modern exhibition with wooden frames and showcases displaying creative objects and information.
Past events
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The collection of the Ethnologisches Museum Berlin includes some 10,000 objects which are attributed to the area of ​​present-day Tanzania. Most of the objects were acquired – often in violent ways – during the period of German and British colonial rule. The workshop exhibition Exhibiting.Omissions. Objects from Tanzania and the Colonial Archive questions, remembers, and reconsiders the museum’s objects and their stories: to whom and where did the objects now in the museum’s depot belong? What stories do they have to tell that remain untold or ignored to this day? Should these objects still be on display in Berlin today? And what omissions do we encounter when reflecting on these issues, what remains hidden?

The objects’ problematic colonial and racist past is addressed in several sections. For example, the exhibition includes four display cases in which original objects from the former colony of “German East Africa” are replaced with “surrogate objects” by contemporary artists, among others. Sensitive objects thus attain visibility and are subject to a new, contemporary approach. Even omissions and gaps – in archives, in historiography – are made visible: their trail is marked by blank text boxes and pink-coloured fields.

In this exhibition, the curatorial team in Berlin explore sensitive objects from Tanzania, following a process of consultation with a team of critical companions. Viewed as a preparatory event for a collaborative project, the exhibition will culminate in a presentation curated jointly with the National Museum of Tanzania. The viewpoints of various joint partners and the curatorial team’s new research findings will be integrated into the exhibition along the way. To take a few examples, from March to July 2023 visitors were able to see an intervention entitled “Mingled Living Forces” by students at the art school weißensee kunsthochschule berlin, and since October 2023 the exhibition has included an intervention “Exhibiting.Omissions.Thinking” ahead by students attending the Exhibiting Colonialism seminar at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin’s Institute of History, taught by Janis Nalbadidacis.

At the end of the exhibition, a short documentary film and an accompanying workbook will be made available. Further information can be found below.

Programme