Forced Laborer Memorial Transit
The Forced Laborer Memorial "Transit" is a
History of the city
Process of realization
The realisation of the memorial took 20 years from the passing of the resolution to the inauguration.[1] In 1987 the Nuremberg City Council decided to erect a memorial for Nuremberg forced labourers. The scientific analysis of the history of the deployment of forced laborers in Nuremberg was initiated by the Federal Foundation "Remembrance, Responsibility, Future", which was entrusted with the payment of compensation to victims of National Socialist injustice. The opening event was a contemporary witness discussion that took place in 2002 in the Nuremberg City Archives. Contemporary witness Rob Zweermann complained here that there was no memorial site for the forced laborers deployed in Nuremberg in the Nuremberg city area. His suggestion to set a sign of remembrance was supported by Professor Wolfgang Benz, a renowned historian. The 1987 decision was subsequently given a new Impetus.
The city archives and especially contemporary witness Zweermann, accompanied the further process. Extensive research on the history revealed that between 1939 and 1945 about 100,000 forced laborers from more than 40 countries had been employed at about 150 Nuremberg companies.[2] The focus of employment was on the armaments industry, but there were also deployments in the retail trade and the city administration, for example in the removal of rubble after bombing raids. In order to obtain suitable designs for the forced labor memorial, the Cultural Committee of the City of Nuremberg decided on October 8, 2004 to hold a limited artistic competition and invite eight artists to participate. In the following year 2005, the City of Nuremberg initiated the competition, which the Munich sculptor Hermann Pitz won with his design "Transit" among five submitted works. The jury consisted of twelve members, including cultural and building advisors from the city of Nuremberg, city councillors from all parties, renowned regional and national artists and historians, and Rob Zweerman, a contemporary witness from the Netherlands. The meeting was chaired by Peter Kampehl, Nuremberg artist and chairman of the advisory board for fine arts. The concept of the Transit object was functionally convincing on the one hand because of the successful combination of the street and underground levels of the Plärrer, and on the other because the character of the memorial was also architecturally enriching. The inauguration of the monument took place on 15 October 2007 in the subway distribution floor at Plärrer.
Inauguration
At the invitation of the City of Nuremberg, former forced labourers from numerous countries, such as the Netherlands, Poland and the Ukraine, took part in the inauguration ceremony. Professor
The memorial in detail
The memorial is a six-metre-high funnel-shaped sculpture. It is made up of 3,000 aluminium men who symbolically grab each other's hands and are connected to each other by their feet. This funnel is placed on a light dome of the subway station at the Plärrer and can be therefore viewed both at street level in the form of a dome and underground in its continuation as a cone in the foyer of the mezzanine floor and the pedestrian underpass.
Three explanatory text panels contain the word
"From 1939 to 1945 people were deprived of their dignity. Nuremberg, the city of peace and human rights, commemorates the suffering of the foreign workers who were employed here in all areas of the economy during the Second World War and confesses the injustice done to them."
— Text of explanation panel
The City of Nuremberg invested a total of €50,000 in the realisation of the Memorial.[4]
Location
The memorial is located at the Nürnberger Plärrer,[2] a main traffic junction in Nuremberg. On the one hand, the location is reminiscent of the former Plärrer automat - a generously designed waiting hall with an inn and public telephone - which was a popular meeting place for forced laborers and was of great importance as an inconspicuous information and goods exchange. On the other hand, the central location is intended to keep the history of the forced laborers deployed in Nuremberg in the memory of the city, its citizens and guests.
Criticism
In an interview with Herrmann Pitz, Rob Zweermann, spokesman for the former forced laborers in Nuremberg, criticized the length of the process leading to the realization of the memorial. Lack of understanding and repeated delays on the part of the city administration demanded a lot of patience and perseverance from the supporters. This problem has also been taken up by the Nuremberg press. The budget of €50,000 provided by the City of Nuremberg was described by Zweermann as poor. He put it in relation to the number of forced laborers accommodated in Nuremberg and calculated an amount of 0.50 Euro per person.[4]
References
- ^ a b "Pressemitteilung Nürnberg" (PDF). nuernberg.de. Retrieved 2019-04-30.
- ^ a b Marenda, Arne (2014-03-16). "Zwangsarbeiter-Denkmal (2007)". BAUZEUGEN (in German). Retrieved 2019-04-30.
- ^ "Mahnmal "Transit" erinnert an NS-Zwangsarbeiter - derStandard.at". DER STANDARD (in Austrian German). Retrieved 2019-04-30.
- ^ a b "Das Zwangsarbeitermahnmal TRANSIT in Nürnberg" (PDF). rijo. 2007-11-17. Retrieved 2019-05-03.
49°26′54″N 11°03′56″E / 49.44831°N 11.06553°E
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