The new permanent exhibition at the Günter Grass House in Lübeck
And once again I'm visiting the Günter Grass House in Lübeck's Old Town, which will celebrate its 20th anniversary this coming October. A fitting occasion for the redesign of the bilingual permanent exhibition, entitled " This is Grass ," which offers entirely new insights into the Nobel laureate's work and is the work of exhibition designer Matthias Kaminsky . In recent years, several of the house's offerings have already been digitized. An essential step, without a doubt. Nevertheless, cultural institutions remain analog spaces for direct experience. This is especially true at the site of Günter Grass's long career.
Grass and his beloved Danzig
The entrance, hallway, and garden are now integrated into the overall exhibition, which spans a wide arc from Grass's birth in 1927 to his death and encompasses the exhibition's central theme of "Aftermath." The years of his childhood and youth spent in Gdansk have found a place in every one of the writer's works. The experiences he had in his hometown were one of, if not the, foundations of his entire oeuvre. It is therefore no surprise that in the hallway of the house, which is directly connected to the shop, there is a rug depicting a map of Gdansk. Museum visitors pause, their curiosity immediately piqued by photographs from the artist's childhood.
Video installation with Bela B.
Even more impressive is the video wall made up of nine monitors, displaying a film collage by director Marie König . A mammoth task, as she herself says: to reflect the extensive body of work by Günter Grass while simultaneously conveying a certain timelessness. She included scenes from the film adaptations of "The Tin Drum," as well as sequences from "Cat and Mouse." But also numerous glimpses into the everyday lives of people increasingly overshadowed by National Socialism. Interwoven are scenes of Oskar Matzerath playing the drums and Bela B., the drummer from the band Die Ärzte , who immediately agreed to support the project. Add to that rubble and burning houses. In light of the current, hourly escalation of the war in Ukraine, it's a harrowing experience.
And in the background, above all this, we hear the voice of Günter Grass, who answers the question "Why do I write?" " Blubb, ppschsch – what remains, I write down ."
Take a look at the exhibition:
The LÜBECK ZWISCHENTÖNE team visited the Günter Grass House and reported on Bela B.'s installation. Here's an excerpt from the podcast:
It was a time of dancing mania.
The young Grass greets us in the garden, which now features a bench inviting visitors to linger, absorb the surroundings, and appreciate the inspiring architecture. So typically Lübeck, with its brickwork and North German sky. A large photo wall depicts Grass as a young artist enjoying life in the 1950s, his days filled with travel, dancing, and nights out. A photograph of Grass from 1956 symbolizes the transitional period when the visual artist also became a writer. Above the entrance to the main building, the artist's signature is displayed in LED. In the evening, it serves as a luminous invitation to guests to enter the creative world of the Nobel laureate.
The big world in miniature
Luckily, my secret favorite exhibit from the former permanent exhibition, the general store from Grass's "The Tin Drum," is still there. I fell head over heels in love with it the first time I saw it. The déjà vu of my childhood: the large cash register, a yellow flypaper dangling from the ceiling. My father, too, was a shopkeeper through and through, running a zero-waste store. It just wasn't called that back then. The general store in the Grass House has been complemented by three dioramas by the artist Sara-Christin Richter , who explored symbols and numerous small details from "The Tin Drum." The artist says it takes two to three weeks to complete each figure. You can learn more about her work here
Magic on white paper
Through the glass door lies the large exhibition space. The main room features a "Best of" show of approximately 1,400 of Grass's existing prints. Some of the exhibits, such as drawings from his student days, are being shown publicly for the first time. The tour allows visitors to explore the full spectrum of Grass's work through selected examples – from his early drawings and the Danzig Trilogy to the etchings of the 1970s, the watercolors of the 1990s, and the later works of the 2000s, when Grass further perfected his own techniques. Grass conjured magic on white paper. As a painter and as a writer.
Also on display here is a loan from Grass's son, Bruno: the Olivetti typewriter on which Günter Grass wrote most of his novel "The Tin Drum" in the late 1950s, a gift from his father-in-law's sister for his wedding to Anna Schwarz. The wedding date, April 20, 1954, was quite an imposition for his father, says Bruno Grass. His father later gave him the typewriter, and he has now brought it here in a sturdy Aldi bag. "My father certainly never shopped there," he remarks with a chuckle. Grass was, after all, also a private person, a father, a Danziger, and a Lübecker. Wherever he did his shopping.
