Coming to Terms with the Past

The active approach to the top­ic of abuse and pedo­sex­u­al­i­ty is already evi­dent in the title of the exhi­bi­tion: ​“Work­ing it out!” Here both insti­tu­tions face their respon­si­bil­i­ties using the means of the muse­um and archives, research­ing, coop­er­at­ing and exhibit­ing. In doing so, they encounter the dif­fi­cul­ty that legit­imiz­ing doc­u­ments such as artis­tic rep­re­sen­ta­tions of sex­u­al­ized bod­ies of chil­dren and young peo­ple, which are so wide­spread in cul­tur­al his­to­ry and have con­tributed to the nor­mal­iza­tion of attacks, should not be shown. This is the moment our design office comes into play.

As with numer­ous exhi­bi­tion projects before, chezweitz took on the chal­lenge of sceno­graph­ic imple­men­ta­tion with great sen­si­tiv­i­ty. The type of pre­sen­ta­tion in the image of the archive and the art of ​“not show­ing” open the top­ic for open dis­course. We use the archive as a design metaphor, allud­ing on the one hand to the hold­ings of the two archives involved, which give rise to the exhi­bi­tion, and on the oth­er hand to the fun­da­men­tal incom­plete­ness of such pro­cess­ing process­es. The ​“open­ing of the box­es” and the crit­i­cal exam­i­na­tion of the changes with­in the his­to­ry of the move­ment now become exem­plary. The often encoun­tered approach of insti­tu­tions to triv­i­al­ize or cov­er up their own involve­ment in sex­u­al vio­lence against chil­dren and young peo­ple, i.e. to keep the box­es closed, is bro­ken down in terms of con­tent and scenog­ra­phy in this exhibition.