Berlin museum confronts how Adolf Hitler won German hearts

Image of power: busts of Hitler from the Thirties in the exhibition
12 April 2012

A Berlin museum is opening an exhibition exploring how Adolf Hitler won and held mass support among Germans.

Hitler and the Germans - Nation and Crime, which opens tomorrow at the German Historical Museum, juxtaposes the Nazis' propaganda images and artifacts such as Hitler busts with footage and documentation on the Nazi regime's brutality and Germans' involvement in it.

Germany has seen many exhibitions exploring the events of the Nazi era, but this one puts Hitler himself at the forefront.

Curator Hans-Ulrich Thame said he was trying to explore "how this power and influence, this domination of Adolf Hitler can be explained, and to make clear that one of the factors was the readiness to approve and the readiness to go along of large parts of society".

The collection of 600 exhibits, 400 photos and posters, takes visitors chronologically through the life of the regime. Nearly three-quarters of the material comes from the museum's extensive stores.

It portrays the Nazis' dual approach of making the German masses feel included in their movement - illustrated by a case full of various Nazi uniforms and a rally flag - while excluding those whom they had identified as enemies, such as Jews.

The latter is underlined by photos of Jewish deportations and of hospital patients being taken away to be killed - exhibited alongside an order signed by Hitler for the "incurably ill" to be granted "mercy death" - along with a note from a German company about equipment being supplied to the Auschwitz death camp.

The exhibition shows Hitler's ubiquity in Nazi-era German life in everything down to playing cards, yet Mr Thame, who is a historian and professor at the University of Muenster, steered clear of securing any personal belongings of the dictator. He argued that they would have little explanatory value and said he did not want to "support the peculiar fascination" that such items might exert.

Mr Thame said Hitler had little natural charisma: "All he could do was speak and agitate, but he (got) his charisma above all from expectations. Other people presumed that he was the one who could bring salvation and national healing."

The curator said he was not worried that fringe far-Right groups might try to take advantage of the exhibition.

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