MEDIA INFORMATION

 
 
 
COLLECTION NAME:
Graduate Thesis Collection
Record
Title:
The City as Theater of Memory: Palimpsest in Shimon Attie’s Berlin Project
Creator:
DesRosiers, Amy Allison
Subject:
Thesis (M.A.) -- Art History
Subject:
Savannah College of Art and Design -- Department of Art History
Rights:
Copyright is retained by the authors or artists of items in this collection, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.
Abstract:
This thesis explores the notion of the city as a text in constant revision both in terms of its
physical and psychological constructions. I elaborate this theory by looking at Berlin in the
twentieth century through Shimon Attie’s project The Writing on the Wall: Projections in
Berlin’s Jewish Quarter (1991–1993). Attie’s project occurred in Berlin’s central district, Mitte
only a few years after the wall came down in 1989. The early nineties provided a unique setting
for a growing art scene with a fresh abundance of foreign influence. Divisions and reunifications
punctuate Berlin’s twentieth-century history, the time of Attie’s installation marking another
period of cultural re-integration.
Abstract:
Keywords:
Berlin, Mitte, Scheunenviertel, German Democratic Republic, architecture, construction,
identity, World War II, archive, the void, temporality, the city, Jewish culture
Publisher:
Savannah, Georgia : Savannah College of Art and Design
Date:
2015-03
Format:
PDF (59 pages) : illustrations (some color)

The City as Theater of Memory: Palimpsest in Shimon Attie’s Berlin Project