Tag: Memorial

The film “Neuaubing/Freiham” is about the development of the new urban quarter in Freiham and the parallel process of making the historic site of the RAW camp visible. In the postwar years the historic context of the site was increasingly forgotten as ever more time went by and the site was used for various other purposes.

Nationwide social debates about how to confront the issue of forced labor as an aspect of the Nazi past and about possible compensation payments for the former forced laborers took place at a national level in the 1990s, while plans for the 350-hectare new development in Freiham began to take shape in the 2000s. Both of these developments contributed to making the history of the RAW camp more visible again.

The initial planning for the Freiham development included the historic site of the former camp. Plans to build a large supermarket and a furniture store there prompted the users, who had been using the barracks as studios and workshops since the 1970s, and later the City of Munich, to have historical research carried out.

Today, the historic site is subject to a preservation order while in Freiham the first apartments and educational facilities have been completed. Bechtle and Kahane explore the reciprocal effects of these developments from the perspective of the manager of the new quarter, Daniel Genée. This raises questions about what function the future memorial site will have for the diverse local population, what expectations are associated with it, and what its practical implications are.