Peter Weiss' Pergamon Frieze

The Pergamon Altar is one of Berlin's most famous museum pieces. Its discovery, excavation and subsequent appropriation by the German Imperial Museums in Bergama Turkey at the end of the nineteenth century led to the most remarkable addition to the Kaisserreich's collections, which untill then did not rank with the Louvre or the British Museum. As one member of the Prussian Parliament said at the time: "The incorporation of the Pergamon Altar into our collections in one stroke puts them on par with the greatest collections in Europe." This 'incorporation' did not only upgrade the Empire's cultural trove, but the content of the frieze--the battle between gods and giants--served ideological purposes as well. Indeed, the gods' resounding defeat of their enemies seemed to resonate with Prussia's recent victories in 1866 and 1870/71 over her opponents. The reinvigorated monarchy easily and readily recognized its own successes in the monumental representation.

Since its acquisition the frieze has captured the imagination of different political regimes. It has inspired monumental architectural visions in the heirs to the Kaiserreich, the Nazis; it has been integrated into and used in the Kulturpolitik of the GDR; but it also, famously, opens Peter Weiss's novel "The Aesthetics of Resistance" as a model and monument not for the rulers but for the oppressed and defeated. The pathway to be installed will spell out the various modes of 'incorporation' and appropriation of this great artwork in the history of Berlin.