In 2019, the Asiatic Art and Ethnographic collections, presently housed in Dahlem on the southwestern outskirts of the city, will move into the Humboldt Forum, the future name for what was previously the town home of the Kaisers.
Certain parts of the current Dahlem gallery will close from the beginning of next year and other parts from January 2017. The Dahlem site, which is close to the city's Free University and was established at the start of the Cold War as a counterweight to the Humboldt University and collections in the downtown area, then under communist control, will house just the Museum of European Cultures.
The collection incorporates huge water crafts brought once again from the South Pacific, American Indian totem poles and even a whole cave with Asian rock paintings. A portion of the bigger exhibits is already set up, brought in during building work, as they would not have fitted through the door later.
The Humboldt Forum aims to rival the Centre Pompidou in Paris as a venue for presentations and social events. The attention will be on art and culture from outside of Europe, as a counterpoint to the European collections on the nearby Museum Island. The erection of the Humboldt Forum has not been without controversy. The old castle, home to the Prussian lords and the later Kaisers, parts of which dated back to 1443, was severely harmed by bombardment by the Red Army toward the end of World War II.
It was torn down in 1950 to clear a path for the Palace of the Republic, constructed in the 1970s to house the parliament of communist East Germany. This was in turn destroyed from 2006, with asbestos contamination referred to as a major concern, regardless of strong complaints from numerous Berliners and East Germans.
The choice to reconstruct an apparently baroque palace with a modern interior was also questionable, not only on grounds of expense. Finishing the spectacular ensemble between two arms of the River Spree is expected to help Berlin's aspiration to make up for lost time with Paris and London as two of Europe's top travel destinations.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
