抄録
Reinhart Koselleck (1923–2006) left a large amount of photography in the basement of his private house in Bielefeld. This essay explores his research on war memorials in terms of image and attempts to clarify his project, “political iconology”.
Koselleck became actively involved in the dispute about the Neue Wache and the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin in the nineties. Among Koselleck’s statements, his criticism of the iconographic meaning of the monuments is remarkable. Koselleck employs the same approach in his historical research on war memorials, which focuses on the transformation of this art form in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. His political iconology of monuments sheds light on the conflict between plasticity and political sensitivity.
Koselleck’s interest in visual issues dates back to the early sixties, when he wrote a short essay entitled “About the Political Iconology.” The images became a theoretical apparatus for his Historik in that they possessed historical rhythm and historicity. Photography of the war memorials seems to represent an aura of past experiences, but it also involves a mechanical gaze decomposing sediments of time crystallized on the image. This essay concludes that political iconology contributes to Koselleck’s project of “History in the Plural.”
