This work was created especially for the 9/11 (September 11, 2011) Edition of the Berliner Zeitung. It is inspired by the scientific theory of "Flashbulb Memory."

"We have all had the experience that in exeptional moments when startling or shocking news has been heard, the brain seems to store permanently all temporal and visual information as vivid and lasting memories. The Assassination of JFK, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and 9/11 are all examples of this phenomenon. As a born New Yorker, transplanted to Berlin, the actual moment and following hours upon hearing the news of 9/11, remain frozen and imprinted, while the days before and after have long lost their significance." - Arnold Dreyblatt

Dreyblatt's work reflects on such themes as recollection and the archive, and he has created a number of artworks related to autobiographical memory: including the installations "Flashbulb Memory" (2002) and "Recovery Rotation" (2003).

Permanently installed in four meetings rooms within the new Ministry of Agriculture, Nutrition and Consumer Protection (BMLEV), Wilhelmstrasse, Berlin, and dedicated in 2010. Winner, 1st Prize, Invited Competition, Federal Ministry for Buldings and Public Spaces (BBR) Berlin, 2008

Inscriptions is concieved as an interactive textual dialogue with the employees of the Ministirium who will pass through, meet and work in four meeting rooms. Lenticular printing technology was chosen as an perceptually interactive means of display. Each work contains up to five text layers, which are viewable as text fragments from varying viewing positions, and which seem to "overwite" each other as in a "palimpsest". As the viewer moves about the room, different text content appears and disapears, allowing one to 'create' one's own narrative about the history and workings of the BMELV Ministry. In this way the employee should become participants in a dialogue with the work, which can only be 'completed' through movement and reflection.

Text excerpts will be chosen as content for the work from the following themes:
a) the history of the BMELV Ministry;
b) the historical and architectural context of the building;
c) descriptions of activities and goals relating to the work of the BMELV Ministry;
d) historical and contemporary quotations from literature and science on subjects such as agriculture, nutriton, etc.

A theme has been concieved for each of the four meeting rooms:
1. Wilhelmstr. Nr. 54, history of the building housing the Ministry
2. Agriculture: texts from Marcus Porcius Cato (234 v. Chr. - 149 v. Chr.), Albrecht Daniel Thaer, (1752 - 1828), Johann Heinrich von Thünen, (1783 -1850)
3. Agricultural Politics and Policy in Germany
4. Consumer Protection

The work was commissioned by- and is installed within the Permanent Exhibition at the Jewish Museum in Berlin.

One arrives at the site at the end of a journey through German Jewish History representing the last section of the permanent historical exhibition at the museum. This site depicting the "Shoah" is situated at the intersection of pre- and post- war exhibition areas.

Historical documents have been selected from the Museum archives from two sources:
a. Letters from burocratic offices to individuals about preparations for deportation and eventual transports to the east.
b. The last correspondance from Ghettos and extermination camps.

One approaches a glass barrier made up of vertical sections which are either transparent or opaque when data messages begin writing on them. One has the feeling that one cannot proceed further, yet one can see through the panels, revealing a hint of what follows. The visitor is intrigued by the dynamic rhythm of the panels appearing and disapearing, and by the pace of the digital writing on the glass.

Along a line in the floor which transverses the space at an angle (and which represents lines which intersect the original architecture), a glass barrier is built in eight sections, each 1 meter wide and 3 meters high. Four data projectors are mounted from the cieling behind the glass barrier and are connected to a computer.

A section of mirrored glass is mounted on the right diagonal wall, opening up the space and reflecting the wall of glass and the dynamic movement of the displays and changing panels.

The barrier is composed of eight 'Priva-lite' glass panels, each 2.5 x 1 meters mounted in steel frames. When electricity is applied to the glass, it is transparent; when the current is turned off, the glass is opaque, thereby functioning as a projection surface.

The glass panels and the projectors are synchronized. There is one projector each for two panels, representing one document fragment. When a document pair are 'active', the glass becomes opaque, and the document information (left side) and content information (right side) begin 'writing', letter by letter, simultaneously, at eye level.

The four projection pairs are either in an 'active' (projection, opaque) or 'inactive' (transparent) state. From one to four active states may be happening at any one time. The patterns of active and inactive panels is changing all the time, creating a sense of dynamic rhythm in the space. At the same time, sections of the wall seem to disapear and reappear at other locations. The selection and display of the texts is random.

Production:
Text Preparation and Project Coordination: Maren Krüger
Media Design: Thomas Buck
Media Realization: White Void, Berlin
Photos: Copyright Jüdisches Museum Berlin; Foto: Jens Ziehe

Installed Permanently at: Jewish Museum, Berlin, 2008

The project won first prize in the invited competition: "Software of Memory" ("Software des Errinnerung") which was initiated by the Kulturinstitut Stadt Braunschweig in 2006. The project is as yet unrealized.

A book on the project was published by Appelhans Verlag Braunschweig in 2008 under the title: "Software der Erinnerung Künstlerischer Wettbewerb zur Markierung von Orten in Braunschweig mit nationalsozialistischer Vergangenheit, Braunschweiger kulturwissenschaftliche Studien, Veröffentlichungen des Kulturinstituts der Stadt Braunschweig, Bd. 3 (ISBN 978-3-941737-06-8).

The project was presented in an exhibition at the Stadtbibliothek Braunschweig from June 11 to 20, 2009 along with works by Pia Lanziger and other artists who took part in the competition. At the opening ceremonies on June 11, Dreyblatt and Lanziger, along with Stadtrat Wolfgang Laczny, Dezernat für Kultur, Schule und Sport and Barbara Straka, Präsidentin der Hochschule für Bildende Künste Braunschweig participated.

Project Desciption:

Through the use of the title phrase: 'Ich war in Braunschweig...', passerby and pedestrian are addressed directly and are confronted with traces of individuals who have lived in Braunschweig, but are no longer present.

It is as if to say, 'I was here where you are now standing, I was born here, or I have been forced to come here against my will, I have lost my home, I have been mistreated, exploited, imprisoned, expelled, etc. I am no longer in Braunschweig. Let this be a sign that I have passed though this place.'

The project focuses on the connections between a geographical location and personal history. In this way, an individual is given a voice and is remembered by an activation of his or her 'biographical details' at the places in Braunschweig through which these persons actually passed during the years of National Socialism.

Locations which now appear seemingly innocent and stripped of memory in the contemporary city-scape, re-emerge in a reconstructed topography of marked places and implied events and faces.

A network of individual 'Datastations' to mark major locations in the Braunschweig city-scape where persons were victimized under National Socialism will be installed throughout the city. The Datastations contain historical personal information which are further linked to an online database and to a 'paper' topographical map.

Exemplary locations have been chosen, representing major sites where the following groups victimized by National Socialism:

1. Jewish Community 2. Sinti Community 3. Forced-labor workers. 4. Political and Active Resistance members.

Additionally, the choice reflects sites in which many individual destinies have crossed paths. An attempt has been made not only to include sites related to the aforementioned victimized groups but sites important for the administrative and burocratic implementation of National Socialist control.

The Datastations function both as 'sign objects' marking places and as active displays of personal history. Additionally, they function as dynamic 'index cards' or 'questionaires', functioning as a metaphor for the burocratic collection of personal information, which makes a system of totalatarian control such as National Socialism possible. The Datastations show the past and succeeding 'biographical stations' of each individual who passed through that particular site, so that one can percieve each individual history and fate in relation to other fates and locations. This information is presented as a kind of compressed scrolling 'timeline'. At the same time, other sites in Braunschweig through which this person passed through are indicated as 'links' to other Datastations, and those addresses are given accordingly.

At the inception of the project, a research group is set up to collect personal data for use in the project network. The members of this group might function as a pedagogical project with history and art students in Braunschweig. Additionally, a brochure is printed which will be available at tourist offices, museums and other public sites. The broschure contains a short description of the project, and contains a current topographical map to all the 'Datastation' locations.
   Dreyblatt-Braunschweig mappe-pdf
   Ein Oeffentliches Archiv-Fehr-pdf
   Presentation Kulturinstitut- pdf

'Innocent Questions' was the winner of a closed competition initiated by the The National Foundation for Art in Public Buildings, Oslo (Utsmykkingsfondet for offentlige bygg) in 2004 for a permanent artistic work in front the Villa Grande, a villa occupied by Vidkun Quisling from 1941-1945. The Villa is currently the site of the "HL Senteret", The Center for Studies of Holocaust and Religious Minorities.

In developing a concept for an artistic intervention for the Villa Grande I preferred not be limited by the particular historical circumstances associated with this site. I have chosen rather to focus on the use of the 'personal questionnaire' in population registration systems as the defining element that thematically connects the Holocaust in Norway with other genocides of the twentieth century and with the administration of foreigners and other minorities in contemporary society.

The winter snow and the dramatic approach up the hill to the site call for a vertical installation as a transformation of the imposing and grotesque historical building facade. In renovating and reconstructing the 'Villa Grande,' fire and safety regulations required an external stairwell to be fixed on the facade to the left of the main entrance. I proposed to utilize the structure of the stairwell in order to physically support the installation of 'Innocent Questions.'

Attached to the structure of the stairwell is an array of twelve panel-boxes, mounted within a steel frame. These panels are designed to form one unified image (size: 8330 x 4070 cm.), which is perceived in three distinct optical layers:

Non-Reflective Image: Sandblasted onto the hardened surface of the outermost glass layer of each panel is a reconstruction of a historical 'punch card' , representing the reduction of the individual to number and category. This image is perceived as non-reflective, creating a heightened contrast to the reflectivity of the underlying mirrored surface.

Reflected Environment: The work functions as a mirrored wall that reflects the natural environment: the trees and sky, and the visiting public. The face of the historical building is thereby opened and partially erased.

Illuminated Texts: Mounted onto the rear of each panel within the punch card image, are words and phrases written in fixed light-emitting diodes (LED's). This textual content has been derived from historical and contemporary personal questionnaires.

The rear of the work is sealed, and the illuminated red LED texts appear as an ephemeral image, suspended in the reflecting mirror. Only the illuminated LED texts are seen through the mirrored glass, which is otherwise fully reflective of the environment.

The words and phrases appear and disappear within a slow and randomly generated temporal composition perceived within the virtual punch card image. Because the appearance of illuminated words and phrases is continually changing, new combinations of words and phrases arise, igniting unexpected associations from the questionnaire entries as one passes the work.

During the hours of daylight, the mirror glass reflects the trees and sky. The information layers (non-reflective image, reflected environment and illuminated text) are clearly visible. In the hours of darkness, artificial side lighting illuminates the non-reflecting sandblasted surfaces of the outer glass layer, which would otherwise be imperceptible.

In my concept for a permanent installation at the site, a list of 'Innocent Questions,' derived from historical and contemporary sources and representing a composite collective questionnaire, is contrasted with the image of a historical 'punch card.' Together, this is a representation of the collection, archiving and application of personal data by political systems for administrative and often questionable use.

A granit plaque, permanently mounted with brass bolts into cement and permanently installed in a school courtyard.
The work was dedicated in December, 2004 on the occasion of the art project "Leerstelle", curated by Galerie Ozwei.

A large flower wreath was installed on the stone for the dedication ceremonies and was left to dry for some days before being stolen. The location of the work simulates an isolated grave or memorial area, being framed by a wire fence of DDR-Vintage allowing an unexpected discovery and functioning as a site for contemplation and recollection.

The stone is engraved with the phrase:

Si Monumentum requiris,
circumspice.
MDCCCLXVII - MMIV

The latin phrase, ("If you require a monument, look around you") was inscribed by the son of the architect Sir Christopher Wren at his gravesite in St. Pauls Cathedral in London upon his death in 1723. The dates refer to the lifespan of the schoolyard area, one of the oldest in Berlin.

Permanently Installed:
Gustav-Eiffel-Schule in Berlin-Prenzlauer-Berg, 2005.