From 1975 to 1986, the photographer Sibylle Bergemann accompanied the development of a monument to Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels for East Berlin. This project, first conceived in the aftermath of the Second World War and the ebullience surrounding the creation of the German Democratic Republic, only began to take shape more than twenty years later. Its realisation was entrusted, in 1973, to the sculptor Ludwig Engelhardt and a group of four other artists in his circle.

Bergemann at first worked informally, then in 1977 received an official commission from the GDR Ministry of Culture. For a period of eleven years, she photographed the various stages of the process, from the earliest mock-ups to the inauguration of the monument on 4 April 1986.

While some of Bergemann’s images were published and even exhibited starting in 1983, it is only in 1987-88 that she fully reappropriated the fruits of this commission. From among more than 400 rolls of film, she selected twelve photographs to constitute a series today known as Das Denkmal (“the Monument”).

Sonia Voss is an exhibition curator. Her exploration of East German photography led to the exhibition Restless Bodies at the Rencontres d'Arles 2019 and several related books, including The Freedom Within Us. Her research has since extended to Eastern Europe, especially the Lithuanian scene from the 1970s and 1980s, which she presented in an extensive group show at Paris Photo 2024. She curated the Louis Roederer Discovery Award at the Rencontres d'Arles 2021. She also accompanies artists such as Isabelle Le Minh, Anton Roland Laub, and Tarrah Krajnak. Occasionally, she delves into archives, such as that of Uraguchi Kusukazu, whom she introduced to the public in 2024 (Ama, Rencontres d’Arles), or Sibylle Bergemann’s vast work around the Marx-Engels monument in Berlin, which she will present in October 2025 at the Henri Cartier-Bresson Foundation in Paris. She lives and works in Paris and Berlin.

Sonia Voss