The Linden-Museum houses thousands of objects, photos and documents from Afghanistan. Their exciting, sometimes problematic stories tell us a lot about personal experiences and memories, but also about political and economic backgrounds and interdependencies. They represent highly ambivalent facets of German-Afghan relations in the past and present. A working group of interested people from Stuttgart and the surrounding area, both with and without a connection to Afghanistan, focused primarily on the photographs of the Stuttgart Badakhshan Expedition (1962/63). The results of their work were exhibited in the museum’s LAB room on the 1st floor.

LAB 5 focused on the relationships between people, objects and the museum as an institution. How are these relationships formed and developed? What language and space do we need for this? The theme of language is central to a museum. In guided tours, exhibition and catalog texts, press releases and other media, we speak to and with the visitors. As a museum, we position ourselves through this: What does it mean to write in a non-discriminatory and gender-appropriate way? How can we use easy language to make texts more understandable? How can we change our everyday spoken language? What structures need to be broken down to achieve this? Which images do we use and which do we not?

The LindenLAB was funded as part of the Initiative for Ethnological Collections of the German Federal Cultural Foundation.

In times of political change, Helena Cing Deih Sian explored the current significance of the architectural heritage in Yangon/Myanmar. She examined the relationship between the spatial environment and political development.

In the cabinet exhibition, contemporary witnesses talked about 14 places in Yangon. These places have been left out of the ideological narratives of the military dictatorship and their significance for the future development of building culture and urban planning has not been taken into account. The stories about these places that have not yet been told are counter-narratives of the civilian efforts for democracy and freedom. These places stand out as “unofficial heritage sites” and underline the urgency for the question of who is entitled to dispose of them. Do they have to be specialists or can people without expertise have their say? What can remain and what will be demolished?

The exhibition offered an insight into the discourse surrounding the contested architectural heritage. With the aim of establishing a culture of remembrance for Yangon, Helena Cing Deih Sian invited visitors to participate and contribute their thoughts. After its stop in the South/Southeast Asia section of the Linden-Museum, the traveling exhibition was shown in cities with a large Myanmar diaspora: Frankfurt, Berlin and Hamburg.

In the exhibition, 26 Tübingen students from China talked about arriving in a foreign country, studying at the University of Tübingen, cooking spaghetti in the dormitory kitchen, the expectations they brought with them, new friendships and dreams for the future. Tübingen was representative of all German universities: Students from China have long been the largest foreign student group at these universities. But how do the students from China experience their everyday life in Tübingen? What is their experience at the university? What problems do they encounter? What is new and important for them? How can togetherness be created on campus? And above all: What do they ultimately take back home with them from their stay in Germany – from their own “Chapter Germany”?

In order to be able to answer this question, they were accompanied in their everyday lives by twelve master’s students from the Ludwig Uhland Institute for Empirical Cultural Studies in Tübingen in a three-semester study project. During interviews, numerous joint cooking evenings and excursions, friendships and partners in joint research for the study project group were formed. The experiences of the Chinese students were the theme of the exhibition and they also had their say in the exhibition.

The “Chapter Germany” exhibition was created in close cooperation with the China Centrum Tübingen and the students and teachers of the International Master of Interior Architectural Design course at HFT Stuttgart. It was shown at the Linden-Museum Stuttgart as a cabinet exhibition in the East Asia department.

What does the Linden Museum have to do with German colonialism? Which Württemberg actors were involved in colonialism? How present was colonialism in the everyday world of Württemberg? And how does it continue to have an effect today? The workshop exhibition showed the museum’s colonial connections between 1882, the year in which the Württembergischer Verein für Handelsgeographie was founded as the museum’s sponsor, and around 1940, and included effects up to the present day.

An important role was played by Karl Graf von Linden. He was chairman of the sponsoring association and left his mark on the museum during the colonial period. Accordingly, the museum was named after him in 1911. In addition, other personalities were presented who are part of stories that took place between the museum, Württemberg and the colonies. We also asked about those about whom we know little due to the colonial circumstances, but who were nevertheless instrumental in building up the collections. In a further step, the colonialist association system, which also includes the sponsoring association, was examined. Associations shaped social life and served as multipliers of colonial ideologies. Events such as colonial conferences, exhibitions and so-called “Völkerschauen” or objects of everyday culture show how deeply rooted colonialism was also in Stuttgart. The question was asked what continuities remain to this day.

Another thematic focus dealt with violence and focused on the so-called “Boxer War” in China (1900/01) as an example. Hundreds of Württemberg soldiers volunteered for this war, from which the Linden-Museum owns looted objects. Württembergers who took part in colonial expeditions and wars were honored with commemorative plaques and monuments, some of which still exist today. How should this be handled?

Provenance research at the museum was incorporated into the exhibition. In addition, the Linden-Museum specially commissioned a study on Württemberg and colonialism. Viewing the country’s history in the context of colonialism and highlighting the many cross-connections between institutions, people, and events is a new approach. Although some issues have been worked on before, scientific research and debate is just beginning on many issues. Critical distance and multi-perspectivity are central in order to avoid a one-sided or even nostalgic retelling of colonial history from the perspective of Württemberg actors. The fact that the debate was very much in motion was also evident in the exhibition. Based on the idea of the workshop, visitors were asked to answer questions, record their own thoughts or criticism and contribute or question their knowledge. The visitors were able to adopt different viewpoints and perspectives, gaps and connecting lines were revealed and the content was put up for discussion.

In public collections, archives and museums, political perspectives are (re)constructed and shaped in order to provide structures and content for the communication of history. In the process, a Eurocentric canon of knowledge was created over generations, which was critically and artistically questioned by students of the ABK Stuttgart in an exhibition. During the summer and winter semesters of 2021/22, students engaged in artistic research processes with selected (virtual) collections and the spaces of the Linden Museum in connection with the LindenLAB. In this exhibition, they presented their artistic works as new approaches and perspectives for communicating history and the present in a museum context.

RE-EXPLORE / RE-WRITE II was a seminar and an exhibition of the Intermedia Design Department, Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design, under the direction of Professor Antonia Low and the artist Luise Schröder, in close collaboration with Henrike Hoffmann, project coordinator of the LindenLAB at the Linden-Museum.

How do you trace the origin of objects? How did they get into the museum? Who gave them to the museum? In what context were they collected? Were they bought, given, traded, or possibly stolen? What consequences does this have for museums and scientists working with the objects today? These are the typical questions that provenance research deals with. LindenLAB 2 “Objects and Collectors” also addressed the question of how to communicate the results and working methods of provenance researchers.

The installation in LindenLAB 2 invited visitors to playfully experience the working methods of provenance researchers based on a real research assignment. Visitors were given an insight into the working methods and sources used and were able to discover the history behind them for themselves.

For LindenLAB 2, the collection of Karl Holz (1857 – 1934) was intensively considered. Holz was a merchant who probably emigrated to Chile in the early 1880s, henceforth calling himself Carlos Holz and supplying Karl Graf von Linden with many objects, especially Mapuche. What is the story behind his collection? What obstacles, twists and historical incidents are involved?

Public collections, archives and museums in particular have (re)constructed and shaped political perspectives in order to provide structures and content for the communication of history and culture. In the process, a Eurocentric canon of knowledge has developed over generations that needs to be critically and artistically questioned. The starting point for the artistic-scientific research was the (virtual) rooms and collections of the Linden-Museum. In the entrance area as well as in the rooms of the LindenLAB and the permanent exhibition, the first questions of critical investigation and reflection on collection practices and classification systems in the museum were presented.

On display were works by Marie David, Veronika Schneider, Julia Schmutz and Leonie Weber. An exhibition with final works was realized in 2022.

re-explore / re-write was led by Prof. Antonia Low and the artist Luise Schröder and took place in close cooperation with the Linden-Museum Stuttgart and the LindenLAB under Henrike Hoffmann.

A cooperation of:
Stuttgart State Academy of Art and Design, LindenLAB
With the kind support of: Kulturstiftung des Bundes

The Baden-Württemberg State Exhibtion, on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the landing of the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés in the Gulf of Mexico opened up a new, in-depth look at the culture of the Aztecs. Beginning with the periphery of the Aztec empire (ca. 1430 – 1521) and the natural and cultural diversity of Mexico, the exhibition approached the interior of the empire and its capital Tenochtitlan. This part of the exhibition focused on two of the world’s four surviving Aztec feather shields and a high-quality greenstone figurine.

After passing through the ruling palace of Emperor Moctezuma, the visitors entered the very heart of the empire: the sacred precinct with the main temple Templo Mayor. The tributes that the Aztec empire imposed on its conquered provinces served as a guideline for the exhibition. They flowed to Tenochtitlan and in large numbers on to the Templo Mayor, as offerings to the gods.

An accomplished art

The Aztec stone sculptures captivate with their naturalistic and detailed representation, often combined with calendar signs, characteristics of certain deities or the combination of different gods. Valuable mosaic masks, feather work and gold jewelry give an idea of the splendor the conquistadors found at the court of the Aztec ruler. A separate thematic section was dedicated to the colorful illuminated manuscripts. A special feature of the exhibition was the presentation of the latest research and excavation results. The Templo Mayor excavation project and the associated museum provided us with recently discovered offerings that had never been exhibited before.

Top-class lenders

The exhibition presented around 150 high-caliber loans from Mexican and European museums. Lending institutions were the Museo Templo Mayor and the Museo Nacional de Antropología in Mexico City, the Musées royaux d’Art et d’Histoire (Brussels), the National Museum of Denmark (Copenhagen), the Tropenmuseum (Amsterdam), the Museum Volkenkunde (Leiden), the Museum der Kulturen Basel, the Weltmuseum Wien, the Museum am Rothenbaum (Hamburg), the Museum Weltkulturen (Mannheim), the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum (Cologne) and Schloss Friedenstein (Gotha).

Particularly noteworthy are the two feather shields and the greenstone figure from the Württemberg State Museum, which were on display for the first time in the context of Aztec culture.

In the 2019 summer semester, the Institute for Public Buildings and Design at the University of Stuttgart, led by Prof. Alexander Schwarz, addressed the question of the structural future of the Linden Museum. The fictitious task was based on the real-life idea of the intended new building.

Various locations in Stuttgart’s city center were discussed in terms of their potential for the ethnological museum. The respective urban disposition places specific demands on the museum designs and offers space for contemporary curatorial approaches.

In a concluding exhibition at the Linden–Museum, models and drawings of various design positions were presented. The designs, which were created with university freedom, were also intended to stimulate discussion about the significance of the Linden–Museum for the public urban space in the center of Stuttgart.

On February 28, 2019, the family Bible and whip of the Nama leader Hendrik Witbooi (1834-1905), which were donated to our museum in 1902, were returned to Namibia by the state of Baden-Württemberg. In the exhibition, the two objects were shown for the last time in the Linden-Museum.

“The question of how we deal with cultural assets and other objects in our collections that were acquired in a colonial context is increasingly being discussed – far beyond museums. The topic is also gaining relevance in society, because coming to terms with the past is always the starting point for understanding the present. Baden-Württemberg is therefore facing up to its historical responsibility. The return of the ‘Witbooi Bible’ and Hendrik Witbooi’s whip to Namibia is a significant signal and an important step in the process of reconciliation,” said Minister President Winfried Kretschmann in November 2018. The handing over of the Bible and the whip by the Minister of Arts Theresia Bauer to the Namibian President Hage Geingob will take place during a solemn ceremony, organized together with the Witbooi family, on February 28 in Gibeon. “For us, the restitution is at the same time the start of a joint reappraisal of the German-Namibian colonial history,” said Minister Bauer.

The return of the Bible and whip was the first restitution of colonial cultural assets from a museum in Baden-Württemberg. The Bible is of great symbolic and historical significance for Namibia.

Hendrik Witbooi was “Kaptein” during the German colonial period and one of the most important leaders of the Nama groups. Today, he is a national hero of Namibia and is commemorated by numerous monuments. The family Bible with handwritten annotations by Hendrik Witbooi and other family members was very likely captured in 1893 during an attack on Hornkranz, the headquarters of Hendrik Witbooi, by German colonial troops, who proceeded with the greatest brutality and also murdered many women and children.

Hawai’i has been a state of the USA since 1959 and has a very special history. Discovered and colonized by Polynesians more than 800 years ago, it was not until 1778 that Captain James Cook became the first European to reach the islands. Until 1893, the archipelago was a sovereign kingdom, whose last queen was overthrown in the face of fierce opposition from the Hawaiian people. Regaining the lost independence remains an important long-term political goal for many Hawaiians.

In the exhibition, contemporary works by Hawaiian artists met unique objects from the 18th century from the Cook/Forster Collection of the University of Göttingen – current explorations of the Hawaiian present and future were combined with a look into an important past.

Porcelain is one of the great Chinese inventions. At the same time, the beauty of the pottery is based on the perfect interplay of shape, glaze and decoration. Where decorations are omitted, the focus is entirely on the simple elegance of the colored cover.

By the end of the imperial period, Chinese potters, through their extensive knowledge of clay, glazes, and color bodies, as well as their masterful control of firing conditions, had succeeded in producing colors reminiscent of the bright blue of a clear sky, red, delicately speckled bean seeds, or the shiny polished surfaces of bronze mirrors. The pottery masters of the Qing period (1644 – 1911) used the classical ceramics of the Song period (960 – 1279) or the monochrome glazed porcelains of the Ming period (1368 – 1644) as models, but at the same time they also developed new, unusual colors to meet the demanding wishes of their clientele, especially the imperial court. Influenced by the prevailing preference for antiquities, some of her vessels were created in imitation of antique bronzes.

The fascinating color palette and the variety of shapes of these late monochrome porcelains are exemplified by the Dr. Georg Büchner Collection, from which the Linden-Museum Stuttgart presented a representative selection for the first time as a cabinet exhibition.

“Oishii!” – “I like it!” – is the most common word in Japan to indicate good taste at the dinner table. It is an expression that goes hand in hand with the social and cultural identity of the eater. Because food is much more than nutrition in Japan. It is connected with all spheres of human life and provides a view of the most diverse aspects of society.

Against this backdrop, we dedicated a large special exhibition to Japanese eating and drinking culture. The exhibition focused on the cultivation of rice and its importance for Japanese society, the “sacred drink” sake, the role of fish, seafood and seaweed as well as vegetables, noodles and condiments in the kitchen. The world of tea traditions (chanoyu and sencha), the culture of picnics and bento were also addressed. How have eating habits changed throughout history? What complex technological services are required for the extraction and preparation of food? Who eats what when? The exhibition traces all of these questions, at the same time directing our gaze to a rich material culture and encouraging us to become (more) aware of our own food habits.

Originals from the museum’s own collection were presented, ranging from ink and woodcuts to ceramics, including valuable objects that have never been shown before. These were supplemented by loans from Germany and abroad. Multimedia elements bridged the gap between the historical exhibits and the present and also brought Japanese voices into play.

The mysterious interplay of light and shadow has captivated people since time immemorial. As cultural expressions of this fascination, rich traditions of shadow theater have developed, especially in Asian countries such as China, Indonesia, and India. The exhibition used top-class collections to show the close links between the shadow theater traditions of Asia, the Orient and Europe.

In addition to the similarities in performance principles, aspects of storytelling or the typology of characters, regional characteristics of shadow theater came into focus: In India, Java and Thailand, shadow theater is also a ceremonial act in the context of temple festivals, tells great epics such as the Ramayana and is still part of cultural identity today. In China, it incorporates elements of Chinese opera such as music, costumes and masks and becomes a total experience in artistic perfection, while in the Orient it was above all a mirror of society, uniting the audience in shared laughter with great wit and humor.

The exhibition featured previously unseen pieces and rediscovered treasures from the Linden-Museum’s collection. Worthy of mention are the old stocks of Southeast Asian figures, the Chinese figures of the Eger Collection and the unique Egyptian figures of the Kahle Collection – the oldest known shadow puppets of the Islamic world. More recent collections such as the Indian figurines from the Seltmann Collection and the Turkish figurines by the well-known master Ragıp Tuğtekin (1891 – 1982) complemented these old holdings on an equal footing.

The artistic mastery and aesthetic quality of the impressive shadow puppets, which inspired artists such as Franz Marc and still fascinate today, became visible. The enthusiasm for shadow theater in Europe, which reached a final climax in the first third of the 20th century, and the further development of contemporary shadow theater, represented with loans from the International Shadow Theater Center Schwäbisch Gmünd, were also topics of the exhibition.

Atmospheric productions brought narrative traditions to life and combined them with music, song, images and film. Hands-on elements on the “Fascination of Shadows” offered young and old an exhibition experience for all the senses. The exhibition was framed by a multifaceted accompanying program.

Myanmar – the mysterious “Golden Land”: Although Myanmar, formerly Birma, is one of the larger countries in Southeast Asia with an area of 678,500 km² and a population of around 55 million, its culture, art and history are largely unknown. The exhibition provided comprehensive insights into the culture of a country that is making its way into the modern age after many years of isolation.

Anyone who travels through Myanmar immediately recognizes: life there is determined by Buddhism. Centuries-old temples and golden pagodas dominate the landscapes, in every house a shrine is enthroned in the highest place for the daily worship of Buddha and children become monks at a young age.

Using 200 selected originals from top-class international collections, films and music, the exhibition conveyed an impression of Myanmar society and traced the diverse forms of expression of lived religion. The focus was on Myanmar Buddhism and the closely related arts. On display were a throne, impressive Buddha figures from twelve centuries, frescoes, magnificent manuscripts on paper, palm leaf and ivory, filigree wood carvings, lacquer vessels and other objects from Buddhist monasteries. The performing arts also contributed to the communication of Buddhist teachings. In addition to excerpts from performances, costumes, puppets and traditional musical instruments were on display. The highlight was a complete Hsaing orchestra, which consists of a variety of different drums, gongs and other melodic instruments and is used at public events to accompany dances and religious ceremonies.

Astrology and magic still play an important role in Myanmar today. The worship of the Nat spirits is presented in a complete shrine with figurines and votive offerings. Traditional moral concepts and the belief in the effect of colors and patterns, which can have a lasting impact on one’s fate, characterize the arts of body design: The exhibition showed fine silk dresses, hand-woven cotton fabrics, jewelry, traditional cosmetics and tattooing utensils. Works by contemporary artists finally set out in search of a Myanmar modernity.