Memories of Landscape. On Traces of Violence in Nature

The Summer Academy addressed the question of how landscapes become memory spaces of human violence – and how we deal today with these silent, often overlooked archives. Destroyed buildings, ruins of bunkers, old military paths, devastated soils, rivers and forests, in which traces of war crimes and crimes against humanity are inscribed, tell of profound wounds and collective traumas. How do societies deal with such traces and the historical events they refer to? How do art, science, education and civic engagement shape new ways of remembrance and reflection? 

The Summer Academy gathered 19 young professionals from France, Germany, Poland, Ukraine and several Western Balkan countries (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and Serbia) with a professional background in the fields of civic and history education, remembrance work, memory culture or in artistic practice. 

The exchange with experienced experts and workshops focused on both the theoretical examination of connections between nature, art and memory, and project examples from various European countries. Participants shared insights into their own projects and developed new ideas, which were presented and discussed with experts at the end of the summer academy. 

Partner: German Federal Agency for Civic Education