January 2002 - Nr. 1
Goerlitz Opens Silesian Museum
TWIG - A new museum devoted to the history and culture of Silesia opened Saturday (December 15) in Goerlitz, a city on the German-Polish border. The museum, which will serve as Germany’s main research center for the Central European region, was established with state, federal and municipal funds and contributions from an organization for Germans of Silesian heritage.
The museum’s current exhibition, housed in two 16th-century buildings, includes paintings, drawings, sculpture and everyday objects representing 500 years of Silesian history, each item labelled in German and Polish. Highlights include a golden bridal belt, made in Wroclaw (Breslau) in 1600, and two paintings by artists from the 20th-century Bruecke movement, Otto Mueller and Oskar Molln. The museum also documents the political and military upheavals that have devastated Silesia over time, including the expulsion, by turns, of Jewish, Polish, Czech and German citizens.
Silesia’s troubled and sometimes bitter history has divided Europeans in the past. But today the region serves as a bridge between East and West, declared Goerlitz mayor Rolf Karbaum at the museum’s opening ceremony. "The truth has found a home here," added Herbert Hupka of the Landsmannschaft Schlesien. "If we make an effort, we can find our way to each other."
