The XXth Century - People-Places-Times

For twenty years the German Historical Museum has been collecting photographs on contemporary history and everyday life. The collection has come together through purchase or endowment of parts of estates from photographers and picture agencies. In addition to these works, the DHM also collects high-quality artistic photography. Now the time has come to present the extensive repertory of the collection. The exhibition will show photographic highlights with more than 250 motifs in a chronological survey from the last years of the 19th century to the end of the GDR in 1990. Selected from the many metres of storage racks comprising the collection, the photographs offer viewers a tour through the eventful history of the last 130 years. Furthermore, topics such as portraiture, sport and fashion photography make up central aspects of the collection.

In remembrance of the 50th anniversary of the building of the Berlin Wall, the exhibition focuses on this visual sign of the division of Germany and the Cold War, which was erected on 13 August 1961. Numerous photographs document the way the "Iron Curtain" in Berlin cut through streets and houses and tore families apart.

This perspective is now enclosed between book covers: the German-language volume of photographs is entitled Menschen. Orte. Zeiten. Fotografie am Deutschen Historischen Museum (People. Places. Times. Photography at the German Historical Museum) and provides a comprehensive survey of the DHM photography collection, with 616 reproductions, detailed information on the photo library, and more than a hundred short biographies of the photographers and photo agencies. A significant selection can also be found in the Germanlanguage catalogue Das XX. Jahrhundert – Fotografien zur deutschen Geschichte 1880-1990 (The 20th Century – Photographs on German History 1880-1990).

Curators: Dr. Dieter Vorsteher-Seiler, Dr. des. Christin Pschichholz