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🇩🇪 Germany /Disasters & Emergencies

Leipzig’s Marx relief gets a makeover to make Marx look fuller again

From Die Zeit · () German

Translated from German and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth From a news agency Context piece
  • Leipzig’s 33-tonne bronze relief “Aufbruch,” featuring a roughly four-meter-high Karl Marx head, is being cleaned and coated with protective wax.
  • The state is paying about 50,000 euros for the work, which removes harmful oxidation layers and accumulated dirt from the 14.4-by-6-by-3-meter artwork.
  • The relief remains ideologically controversial, but Leipzig University considers it important historical evidence of the university and the socialist era.

Leipzig’s enormous Karl Marx relief is getting a long-overdue clean. The bronze artwork is being thoroughly washed and covered with a protective layer of wax, possibly for the first time in the more than five decades since it was created.

The maintenance costs about 50,000 euros, said Ingo Fischer of the state-owned property and construction management service. Saxony, which owns the work, is paying for the cleaning. The relief, titled “Aufbruch,” once hung on a university building in central Leipzig. After the former East German structure was demolished, authorities placed it on the university’s sports campus following a long and bitter debate over how to handle the monumental symbol of socialism.

The work is relevant to us in terms of university history.

· Rudolf Hiller von GaertringenThe university heritage official explained why the contested relief should be preserved.

The work measures 14.4 by 6 by 3 meters and weighs 33 tonnes. Four employees from Berlin restoration company Haber & Brandner are working from scaffolding, scraping away harmful oxidation layers and dirt crusts. Company branch manager Jana Leukert said the rough surface allowed dirt to become firmly embedded over the decades.

People always say bronze lasts 100 years. But that is nonsense.

· Bert NoackThe bronze specialist emphasized the need for regular maintenance.

Rudolf Hiller von Gaertringen, head of Leipzig University’s collections and heritage department, said the relief had apparently never received proper maintenance since its creation in the 1970s. It first stood above the entrance to the main building of the former Karl Marx University, then spent years in storage after being cut into three pieces. It was reassembled in 2008, but did not receive special care at that time.

The artwork, created by Klaus Schwabe, Frank Ruddigkeit and Rolf Kuhrt, carries a heavy ideological legacy. The building with the relief replaced St. Pauli University Church, which was demolished on the orders of the ruling SED. Hiller von Gaertringen nevertheless considers the relief important university history and contemporary history. Bronze specialist Bert Noack said neglected bronze can eventually develop scars and holes, though the Marx relief remains far from that condition.

The goal is to remove harmful oxidation layers and dirt crusts.

· Jana LeukertThe restoration company manager described the cleaning process.
About this summary

Originally published by Die Zeit in German. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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