Today’s Hansaviertel district, along with the neighbourhood around the Akademie der Künste on Hanseatenweg, emerged from the 1957 Interbau (International Building Exhibition Berlin). During the reconstruction of the Gründerzeit neighbourhood – dating from the latter part of the 19th century and largely destroyed during the Second World War – the visions of the future to be seen in the city of tomorrow exhibition reshaped its surviving street layouts, property configurations and historic foundations. While the technical feats of reconstruction marked a new beginning, they also suppressed a critical reckoning with the sediments of the National Socialist past and its expropriations, expulsions and exterminations. In the course of the rebuilding effort, the properties at Brückenallee 2 through 9, along with the adjacent lots, were consolidated to create the site at Hanseatenweg 10 – the Akademie der Künste’s current location. The overlay of the former and new property lines is clearly visible in the site plan on display in the exhibition, which was prepared for the 1959 development project by the architect Werner Düttmann (Lageplan zum Zwecke der Bebauung, Akademie der Künste, Berlin, Werner-Düttmann-Archiv, no. 544, fol. 5).

Building on research into its own location in the Hansaviertel neighbourhood – as an exemplary site of reconstruction – the exhibition opens up a global perspective on how society deals with such processes. For in times of worldwide wars and climate disasters, reconstruction is an urgent geopolitical challenge. In place of a supposed “Zero Hour”, which, coming on the heels of destruction, gives way to a reconstruction of the social order and power structures, Metaxy – the ancient Greek word for “between” – stands for an intermediate phase in which a society addresses the problems that led to the destruction. The international artistic and spatial contributions exemplify how important the complex political, societal and cultural processes of negotiation that accompanied the reconstruction in various contexts truly are. They show that it is inextricably linked to questions of ownership, return, memory and societal responsibility, and extends far beyond the construction of new buildings.

The following artists and spatial practitioners are contributors to the exhibition and the accompanying programme of discussions and performances: Hala Alnaji, Archigrest, Marina Tabassum Architects, Maja Bajević, Centre for Documentary Architecture, Kees Christiaanse, Tiffany Chung, Co-Haty, Salma Samar Damluji, Nir Evron, Ola Hassanain, Paul Hübner, Open Group, Anton Kolomyeytsev, Omer Krieger, V. Mitch McEwen, megouem, Kioomars Musayyebi, Ute Richter, Sasha Marianna Salzmann, Immanuel Schumacher, Arinjoy Sen, Nurit Stark, Syrbanism, topoScape, Feda Wardak, Eyal Weizman, Ines Weizman, Julita Wójcik, Lebbeus Woods, and Ina Wudtke.

Annette Maechtel is secretary of the Architecture Section.

Postscript: Metaxy : Between Destruction and Reconstruction