BURKHARD SCHITTNY, Fineart

hätte wäre würde

HÄTTE WÄRE WÜRDE
LEGACY PROJECTS 2023
Light installation / Typography / b/w / 6 slide projectors / Plinth-mounted / Dimensions variable

INTRODUCTION
The light installation employs slide projectors solely as sources of light, projecting a beam from inside a room through an open doorway onto the opposite wall. There, an excerpt from the final letter of the forced labourer Nikolaus Lanners to his wife and children appears: “If only I could have a few days of freedom, I would be with you.” Lanners was killed during the bombing of the Unter den Eichen concentration camp in Wiesbaden on 18 December 1944.

As visitors approach the exhibition space, they are confronted by the projected beam of light. It dazzles them and, in a sense, prevents them from entering—a metaphor for the deadly denial of protection experienced by the prisoners, who were refused access to the air-raid shelter during the bombing while the camp guards pointed their pistols at them.

Originally conceived as a site-specific project for Wiesbaden, the work takes this historical location as its point of departure to explore the denial of protection and dignity as a universal experience of violence and exclusion.

INSTALLATION VIEW at Unter den Eichen Concentration Camp Memorial, Wiesbaden