The People's Mansion

On November 12, 2016, an embassy of the German Democratic Republic will officially represent the perished East German state in Los Angeles for four hours. Visitors will enter the “People’s Mansion” through a hall adorned with a monumental flag and tapestries. In the office, they will find a map used in preparation for the occupation of West Berlin and a series of East German and Soviet state portraits, some of them caricatures. Busts of political leaders stare at a video of Günter Schabowksi giving his famous press conference that resulted in the fall of the Berlin Wall. One room will showcase materials related to travels by car (Trabant), train (Deutsche Reichsbahn), and plane (Interflug), as well as on the cruise ship M.S. Völkerfreundschaft, which offered passage to high party officials and winners of the East German lottery. The family room contains games and toys and a table set with cutlery, plates, and glasses from the Palace of the Republic in East Berlin, which, among other things, housed the East German parliament. Another room offers a wide range of East German radios, record covers, and artwork related to dance and music in the GDR. On a darker note, spy equipment typically used by the Stasi (the infamous East German secret police) will be displayed throughout the embassy building, which for one day resurrects state socialism in Beverly Hills.

The People’s Mansion, at 809 N. Linden Drive, Beverly Hills, California, 90210, is a one-day pop-up exhibition organized by the Wende Museum, featuring objects from the museum’s collections of art and artifacts from the Cold War.