In the 68 years since the defeat of Hitler and the end of World War II, countless movie and theater directors, writers, dancers, poets and sculptors around the world have used themes from the Third Reich and the Holocaust as the backdrop for their work, from artist Gerhard Richter's painting of his uncle Rudi in his German army uniform to Quentin Tarantino's movie Inglourious Basterds. In Germany itself, where the philosopher Theodor Adorno once declared that "after Auschwitz, it's barbaric to write poetry," cultural references to the Holocaust are weighed down with especially heavy significance, but that hasn't stopped frequent allusions to the Holocaust on stage and in art galleries. Yet even today, judging by two current incidents that have sparked raging controversies — a production of a Richard Wagner opera in Düsseldorf and an exhibition of German art at the Louvre museum in Paris — Europeans are still struggling to agree on what is thoughtful representation of Nazism in works of art and what is downright unacceptable. Contemporary European politics appears to be playing a role in this debate. Germany's decisive part in the ongoing European economic and financial crisis has made the nation in general and Chancellor Angela Merkel in particular the focus of some ill-tempered attacks, and at times direct comparisons to Nazi Germany, by politicians and the press in countries from Greece to Spain. It has even sparked tensions with long-standing ally France. Germany has long been used to references to its troubled history, knowing it's an easy target. Still, the fierce reaction to the latest events is surprising, even to some experts who have studied Germany's attempts to come to terms with its own past. Norbert Frei, a historian who has done extensive work on Germany's relationship to the Nazi period, including a study of the Foreign Ministry's archives, says that Germany's efforts to come to terms with its own past have continued unabated. "What's different is the role of Germany itself at present, and how others see it," says Frei, who is currently teaching(http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&blog=19871253&post=86305&subd=timeglobalspin&ref=&feed=1)
Via: TIME GlobalSpin