Sibylle Bergemann

From 1975 to 1986, German photographer Sibylle Bergemann documented the creation of the Marx and Engels monument in East Berlin. The project, conceived in the aftermath of World War II and the founding of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was ultimately entrusted in 1973 to the sculptor Ludwig Engelhardt, who allied himself with several other artists.

Bergemann began photographing informally, before receiving an official commission from the Ministry of Culture in 1977. Over the course of eleven years, she captured each stage of the process, from the earliest models to the monument’s inauguration on April 4, 1986.

Despite the publication of some images in the press as early as 1983 and their presentation in an official exhibition, it was only once the commission was completed that Bergemann fully reclaimed the body of work. Out of more than 400 developed rolls of film, she selected twelve photographs, which she brought together under the title Das Denkmal (The Monument). These images reveal a visual language far removed from official aesthetics. In a post-communist light, their deconstruction of heroic figures and underlying irony seem strikingly prescient. Yet no one could have foreseen the fall of the Berlin Wall just two years later. With rigorous objectivity, Bergemann managed to avoid censorship while delivering a stark and laconic portrayal of an ideology’s obsolescence.

In 1990, the publication of a book pairing Bergemann’s photographs with poems by Heiner Müller helped establish The Monument as an artistic landmark in this singular moment of German history. It remains today one of Bergemann’s most iconic series, and a defining piece of the artistic production of that era.

Curator of the exhibition
Sonia Voss
Independent curator

Production
This exhibition is produced by the Fondation Henri Cartier-Bresson, in collaboration with the Centre régional de la photographie Hauts-de-France (CRP) and with the participation of the Estate Sibylle Bergemann.

Biography
Born in Berlin in 1941, Sibylle Bergemann grew up in postwar Germany and later in the newly founded German Democratic Republic (GDR). After training in office administration, she joined the editorial team of Das Magazin in 1965. There, she met photographer Arno Fischer, who introduced her to photography and later became her husband.

From 1967 onwards, her photographs were regularly published in the weekly Sonntag and later in the magazine Sibylle, where she left a lasting mark on the editorial line with her defiant and subtly critical visual language. Alongside fashion photography, she produced portraits and numerous photo-reportages.

The city of Berlin, captured by her both before and after 1989 in all its moods and transformations, remained one of her favorite subjects. Between 1975 and 1986, Bergemann documented the creation of the Marx and Engels monument in East Berlin, resulting in her renowned series Das Denkmal (The Monument).

In 1990, shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, she co-founded the photography agency OSTKREUZ. Commissions from Stern, Geo, and The New York Times finally gave her the freedom to travel the world. She was appointed a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts in 1994.

Sibylle Bergemann passed away in Gransee, Germany, in 2010