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Landsberg am Lech – The innovative exhibition “The Labyrinth – 100 years of Hitler’s imprisonment” marks the 100th anniversary of Adolf Hitler’s release from prison in Landsberg. On the 100th anniversary of Adolf Hitler’s release from the prison in Landsberg on December 20, 1924, the innovative exhibition “The Labyrinth – 100 Years of Hitler’s Detention” presents a new perspective on the history of National Socialism. A 10,000 square meter walk-in installation has been set up on Waitzinger Wiese in Landsberg am Lech. It focuses on the prehistory of the Hitler putsch in Munich in 1923, the trial and Hitler’s time in prison as well as the subsequent reorganization of his political movement from Bavaria.

Hitler’s imprisonment was preceded by the attempted coup on November 8, 1923 in Munich’s Bürgerbräu brewery. After its suppression, the future dictator was arrested in Utting am Staffelsee and taken into custody in Landsberg. The remarkably lenient sentence of five years’ imprisonment for high treason in April 1924 was also carried out in Landsberg.  

Thanks to Hitler’s presence, Landsberg became the third most important town for the NSDAP and its supporters after Munich and Nuremberg. After the seizure of power in 1933, it became a place of pilgrimage for the Hitler Youth. Landsberg’s proximity to the Kaufering subcamp also makes it an important location for the historical exhibition on the prehistory of Nazi rule.

Contemporary history education

“The Labyrinth – 100 Years of Hitler’s Detention” is an innovative way for everyone to interactively explore the history of National Socialism and radicalization. Wolfgang Hauck, designer and initiator of the exhibition, emphasizes: “Contemporary history education must offer more than museum presentations, factual source management and standardized interpretations. It needs open spaces for discourse that enable a dynamic and lively approach to history.”

The expansive installation, designed by historian Edith Raim with Wolfgang Hauck, shows the errors and aberrations of the time. The exhibition not only looks at the historical background, in particular the question of why Bavaria was predestined for radicalization at that time, but also shows where society, the judiciary and politics made mistakes and failed to defend the young democracy from today’s perspective.

Edith Raim explains: “I was particularly interested in why Hitler was so successful in Bavaria in the years leading up to 1923. Hitler’s rise until 1923 would not have been possible anywhere else but in Munich. The Hitler-Ludendorff Putsch is inextricably linked to the Bavarian balance of power. Bavaria was de facto transformed into a dictatorship by Gustav von Kahr’s General State Commissariat, and not only Hitler but also Kahr planned the putsch against the Reich.” The two have deliberately chosen a low-threshold and immersive form of communication: “An exhibition project like this provides space for quotes from diaries or memories, for documents, caricatures or photographs. This enables a deep immersion into the dramatic events of a hundred years ago.”

Hauck adds: “This exhibition is also a warning and shows how quickly democratic understanding can break down under conditions of war and crisis. This means that the issue of radicalization in our time is not over, but requires particular vigilance.”

The exhibition offers new perspectives that aim to break through and expand the iconized tradition of history in black and white images. Stylistic models by Georg Grosz, Otto Dix, Käthe Kollwitz and Paul Klee serve this purpose, as do literary models by Stefan Zweig, Hans Fallada and Ödön von Horvath. Their work and observations are redeveloped with the help of artificial intelligence and transferred to the present day.

The project is funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Science and the Arts, the Bavarian Cultural Fund, the District of Upper Bavaria, the Sparkassenstiftung Landsberg am Lech, the dieKunstBauStelle e.V. association, the Historischer Verein Landsberg am Lech, the Hans-Heinrich-Martin-Stiftung and the town of Landsberg am Lech.