Current exhibition

from 15.11.2022 to 16.12.2022 in the Lobby adjacent to Robert‑Havemann‑Hall
Weekdays from 10:00 am bis 05:00 pm, please contact the administration shortly before

Empty Promises for Hong Kong – Oppression of the Democracy Movement

The exhibition “Leere Versprechen für Hongkong / Empty Promises for Hong Kong” shows the threatening situation of the Hong Kong pro-democracy movement in 2022—3 years after the Hong Kong protests 2019/20 and 25 years after the ‘handover’ of the former British colony to the Chinese state power. The promise of “one country, two systems” has long been broken, the assurance of democracy and human rights for 50 years in the Special Administrative Region no longer applies after only half that time. After an electoral reform in favour of the pro-Beijing camp and the arrest of opposition politicians and dissidents, free elections are no longer possible. With the draconian National Security Act for Hong Kong and under the guise of fighting the pandemic, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of expression are increasingly restricted. Educational reforms and the distortion of facts secure the Chinese Communist Party’s sovereignty of opinion, while Hong Kong’s freedom movement is condemned to silence. This exhibition opposes this and gives Hongkongers a voice. Created by a network of Hongkongers and allies from Hong Kong, Berlin, and other places around the world, it shows how democracy and freedom rights have been eroded in the Asian metropolis in a very short time. On the premises of Berlin’s House of Democracy and Human Rights, they will explain how the rights assured in empty promises are systematically denied today. A Lennon Wall, a popular form of communication widely used in Hong Kong with post-it notes and protest art, gives visitors the opportunity to write messages to the Hong Kong democracy movement and express their own convictions. Events taking place during the exhibition period allow for a lively exchange with Hongkongers and about Hong Kong.

Organiser: Stiftung Haus der Demokratie und Menschenrechte

Events within the framework of this exhibition:

Friday, 16.12.2022 at 07.00 pm, Robert-Havemann-Hall

Finissage and film "Decameron"

Finissage and film screening

Hong Kong director and producer Rita Hui's documentary Decameron (2021) presents a contemporary portrait of the metropolis. Using a combination of fiction, archival footage and current images, Rita Hui sketches a damaged Hong Kong that continues to exist despite suppressed mass protests and the Covid-19 pandemic. In examining ...

Last exhibition

from 7.10.2022 to 7.11.2022 in the Lobby adjacent to Robert‑Havemann‑Hall

The short autumn of utopia 1989

from 7.10.2022 to 7.11.2022 in the Lobby adjacent to Robert‑Havemann‑Hall

The short autumn of utopia 1989

With each passing year, the GDR becomes grayer, its end more inevitable and the events of 1989 more unambiguous. Candles - demos - fall of the wall and that was all? Or was there something else? The exhibition "The Short Autumn of Utopia," realized in 1999, takes precisely this question as its starting point when it focuses on the utopian moment of the autumn of 1989.

Because after decades of nothing going on before and not too much after, there was this intermediate phase, this brief moment in which so much seemed possible. This moment is the focus of the exhibition, with all its peculiarities. The exhibition focuses on the history of the opposition groups, their relationship to the Ausreise movement, the development of the demonstrations, and their attitudes toward the SED and the state apparatus. Who archives, documents and dominates the "Wendegedächtnis"?

The exhibition was designed and conceived by people and groups who themselves made history in a committed and contentious way in '89. It is therefore not only based on generally accessible archive materials, but supplements these with original documents, photos and authentic working materials of the opposition, such as samizdat and flyers. Above all, the contradiction between the central result of the development, the accession to the scope of the Basic Law, and the motives of the protagonists of 1989 will be made clear.

The exhibition is part of the public debate about the representation and assessment of the GDR and its end. The representatives of the GDR opposition were politically marginalized in the process of unification; however, it is worthwhile to remember their work in an unagitated way, especially against the background of their initial successes as well as their failures. The aim is to provide an unsentimental and provisional summary of the events of 1989.

Web: hausderdemokratie.de

Organiser: Stiftung Haus der Demokratie und Menschenrechte

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