Two short documentaries about Alexander von Humboldt, made to celebrate 190 and 200 years since his birth, are typical documents of the history of reception of people from before the GDR. In KOSMOS (GDR 1960), on the one hand, one sees the social commemoration rituals institutionalized by the GDR and on the other the reception is guided in the direction desired and legitimized by the state, through emphasis and omission. The media of the GDR, the DEFA, but also television were part of an industrialized culture of commemoration, which encompassed all areas of social life in a targeted manner. The significance of KOSMOS was also underlined by the choice of the director Karl Gass, one of the most important documentary filmmakers in the GDR.
A CineGraph Babelsberg event in cooperation with the Federal Film Archive and the Deutsche Kinemathek. Introduction: Michael Grisko (mig) (13.5.)
