Returns

Abstract

The destruction of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989 left citizens of East and West Berlin, and others around the world, in disbelief. The Wall’s destruction quickly drew the attention and involvement of American cultural figures and others who identified with the events in Berlin as sites of division and transformation. After 1989, artists powerfully adapted their approaches, embarking on new projects with a set of questions probing the redefining of the United States and Germany as each shifted away from Cold War dynamics. The “American Berliners” of this book offered post-1989 reflections and works that focused on emergent forms of collective memory in Berlin to gather additional histories and mark uneven flows of progress amid the spectacle of the border’s dismantling. The conclusion provides an overview of the Wall’s destruction and some of these projects.