alternative forms of education
alternative lifestyles and resistance of the everydays
avant-garde, neo-avant-garde
censorship
conscientious objectors critical science
democratic opposition
emigration/exile environmental protection
ethnic movements
film
fine arts folk culture
human rights movements
independent journalism
literature and literary criticism media arts
minority movements music national movements party dissidents
peace movements philosophical/theoretical movements
popular culture
religious activism
samizdat and tamizdat
scientific criticism social movements
student movement surveillance
survivors of persecutions under authoritarian/totalitarian regimes
theatre and performing arts
underground culture
visual arts
women's movement
youth culture
applied arts objects
artifacts
cartoons & caricatures
clothing equipment
film
furniture
graphics grey literature
legal and/or financial documentation manuscripts memorabilia
music recordings
other other artworks
paintings
photos publications
sculptures video recordings voice recordings
The digital photography collection of Harald Hauswald was acquired at the end of 2017 by the Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship. It represents a valuable collection from one of the most significant photographers from the GDR. Hauswald’s snapshots from everyday life in East Berlin provide insight into a bygone era, and which acquired public acclaim and support following the toppling of the regime in 1990. The current collection is in the process to be expanded and by the end of 2019 is expected to include the photographer’s entire life work in digitalized form.
The breakdance movement emerged in the GDR in the 1980s. The private collection of Heiko Hahnewald represents one of the largest repositories of materials concerning this movement and provides insight into how breakdance culture found its place within the confines of life in the GDR as well as its continued development after 1990.
The Rock Museum was established in 2014 as a grassroots initiative by former musicians, experts, and collectors. The museum is the first collection in Hungary that presents documents and items of importance to the Hungarian rock and popular music scene (with an international and primarily regional focus) from the late 1950s to the present. Generally, the phenomenon of rock music under state socialism is considered a form of cultural resistance.
The unique resource value of the collection stems from the historical fact that the continuity of Hungarian scouting established in 1910 was in fact maintained by the émigré Hungarian scouting movement worldwide for more than four decades, from 1948 to 1989, in a period when it was prohibited in communist Hungary. According to Hungarian émigré scout leaders, the movement was intended to serve a two-front struggle of cultural resistance: on one hand against the official forgery of “the real” national heritage in communist Hungary; and on the other against the linguistic and cultural assimilation of Hungarian émigré youth within the multi-ethnic environment of some 20 countries of 4 continents worldwide.