Augmented Reality installation

Which stories find their way into the public realm – and which remain invisible? Alternatives Denkmal für Deutschland (ADfD) starts from precisely this premise and asks the question of how migration is remembered and represented. In political and societal discourses about migration in Germany and the European Union, migration frequently appears as an exception or a problem. By contrast, its historical and social dimensions only remain in the public memory in fragmented fashion.

ADfD contrasts this with the point of view that migration should be grasped as a fundamental element of the history of society – as an experience of movement, rupture and continual recomposition. At the same time, the project shows that memory is never neutral: state narratives, urban architectures and cultural institutions determine which stories become visible and which remain marginal.

In the form of an augmented reality installation, it deliberately intervenes into this regime and renegotiates the logic of the monument. Developed in workshops and community meetings with artists, activists and people from a wide range of different backgrounds, ADfD is based on collective authorship. Queer, feminist and migrant perspectives form the starting point for this polyphonic structure in which different experiences and voices meet on an equal footing.

The point of reference for this current version of the ADfD is the Ishtar Gate – a symbol of cultural heritage, but also of change, appropriation and displacement. Transferred into the digital realm, it doesn’t appear as a reconstruction but rather in fragmentary fashion: collages, sculptural elements, text fragments and poetic statements are layered on top of each other to form a visual structure in which images, voices and experiences enter into relationship with one another. This spatial dimension is expanded by sound: interviews, voices and urban noises intensify the physical experience. The digital and physical realms merge and create an open, multi-layered setup.

As an AR installation, ADfD extends beyond the exhibition space and into the public realm. The monument is not erected, but rather activated via the Monuments AR platform. Its appearance is created based on the situation and the movements of the visitors; a sense of the public is produced here by repeated appropriation. In this way, the monument becomes a multi-voiced structure of different memories and perspective without ever settling into a fixed form. During the festival, a workshop with the Alternative Monument collective opens up the monument as a lively platform for exchange and experimentation: together with the participants, it will be explored how a contemporary monument for migration can be designed in public space. As the work continually changes and integrates new voices, it resists the logic of the completed monument and turns remembering into an open, collective practice.

• Sektion Section: An Incomplete Assembly
• Programm Programme: An Incomplete Assembly