RENEE VAN BAVEL – REMONUMENT
During my time as Artist in Residence at the Memorial & Museum Sachsenhausen, I developed the concept work REMONUMENT.
With REMONUMENT, I re-frame the existing monument and give it a new moment. Through a subtle intervention, a small addition, the monument is suddenly placed in the present time, and its story continues into today and tomorrow.
REMONUMENT is a temporary work, done in a respectful way, conscious of the history of the original monument. It is done without affecting the value and meaning of the monument.
This iteration of REMONUMENT was created on February 28, 2022, a few days after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. It involved a 1961 Russian monument dedicated to the victims and Russian liberators of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. The monument’s pedestal lists the names of victims’ home countries, symbolizing a shared international memory.
The word “FRIEDEN,” meaning “Peace” in German, was central to this installation.
Throughout my 2.5-year residency, I engaged with young visitors, school groups, and politicians in a collective ritual of redrawing the word FRIEDEN again and again. This act fostered profound conversations about memory, commemoration, and the current state of our world, bridging past and present through shared dialogue and reflection.
