Art, Memory and Transformation – A European Perspective on 9/11
On September 11, 2026, the world marks the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. A quarter of a century later, remembrance is changing. For a younger generation, 9/11 is no longer a lived experience but history – mediated through images, documents, narratives and cultural memory.
At the Artforum Culture Foundation, together with the Winter Stiftung Hamburg, we believe that art has an important role in this transition from lived memory to history.
(c) Monika von Eschenbach | ArtForum Editions
A remarkable example is “WTC – 9/11: Deconstruction and Reconstruction of the World” by German artist and architect Monika von Eschenbach. The extensive multimedia project was completed and publicly presented in 2024, bringing together years of artistic research into architecture, photography, destruction, transformation and reconstruction.
Two years later, on the 25th anniversary of 9/11, its central question has lost none of its urgency:
What did 9/11 change – and what continues to shape our world today?
Three Artistic Perspectives on 9/11
The significance of von Eschenbach’s approach becomes clearer when viewed alongside two major German artistic responses to September 11.
German-born media artist Wolfgang Staehle became an unintended real-time witness to history. His live internet transmission of Lower Manhattan recorded the attack on and collapse of the World Trade Center as it happened.
Gerhard Richter responded differently. In his painting “September” (2005), he transformed one of the most widely circulated images of the burning World Trade Center into a concentrated reflection on image, memory and historical experience.
Monika von Eschenbach takes the inquiry further in time.
Her focus is neither the immediate moment captured by Staehle nor its condensation into a single image, as in Richter. Instead, she explores what comes after the event: destruction, transformation, reconstruction and the long-term cultural and social consequences of 9/11.
In this sense, three distinct artistic positions emerge:
Staehle captures the moment. Richter condenses it into an image. Von Eschenbach explores its transformation and aftermath.
Architecture, Photography and the Art of Reconstruction
Von Eschenbach’s approach is closely connected to her background in architecture and urban development, including her involvement with major projects such as Leipzig/Halle Airport, Cologne’s MediaPark and the redevelopment of the Rheinauhafen with the famous crane buildings.
Architecture and space are therefore more than subjects in her art. They form part of its conceptual foundation.
Already in the 1990s, she developed methods in which photography was fragmented, transformed and reconstructed into sculptural forms. The principles of deconstruction and construction became part of her artistic language long before the WTC project.
In “WTC – 9/11”, these methods converge with her experience in architecture, conceptual photography and spatial thinking.
WTC – 9/11: Deconstruction and Reconstruction of the World
The title itself describes the central tension of the project.
Deconstruction and reconstruction refer not only to the physical destruction of the Twin Towers and the rebuilding of Ground Zero. They become metaphors for a much wider historical transformation.
What happens when architecture disappears, certainties collapse and societies are forced to redefine their sense of security, identity and orientation?
Von Eschenbach translates these questions into a large-scale multimedia installation. Sculptural photographic works, graphic art, spatial objects, models, performance, dance, music, film and publications interact with one another.
Photography leaves the flat surface and enters space. Images are fragmented and reconstructed. Reality and abstraction, destruction and new formation overlap.
The viewer is therefore not simply confronted with another representation of September 11. The project creates a space in which memory itself becomes physical, changeable and open to reflection.
This is one of its distinctive qualities: 9/11 is treated not as a frozen historical image, but as an ongoing process of transformation.
Completed and Publicly Presented in 2024
The public presentation of “WTC – 9/11: Deconstruction and Reconstruction of the World” in 2024 marked an important stage in the development of the project.
For the first time, its different artistic components could be experienced as a coherent spatial and multimedia work: sculptural photography, installation, performance and publication became parts of one larger reflection on 9/11 and its aftermath.
The project thus moved beyond the representation of a historical event. It proposed an artistic framework for thinking about how destruction changes societies – and how reconstruction can be understood not only architecturally, but culturally and psychologically.
Publications as Part of the Artwork
The publications created in connection with the project extend this idea beyond the exhibition space.
They combine artistic imagery, text and reflection and are therefore more than conventional exhibition catalogues. They form part of the project’s wider artistic and intellectual context.
The bilingual publication “Monika von Eschenbach. WTC – 9/11. Deconstruction and Reconstruction of the World. Kulturclash | Clash of Cultures”, published by KPM | ArtForum Editions in 2024, documents and expands the conceptual framework of the project.
At a time when first-hand memories of September 11 are increasingly becoming historical testimony, such publications also help transmit memory from one generation to the next.
From Germany to the 9/11 Memorial Museum in New York
The project subsequently acquired an important international dimension through the joint commitment of the Artforum Culture Foundation and the Winter Stiftung Hamburg.
Through donations by the two foundations, a publication from the project and a representative artwork by Monika von Eschenbach were accepted by the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York.
This step holds particular significance for us.
A project developed in Germany and Europe in response to the long-term consequences of 9/11 thus established a direct connection with the institution located at the historic site in New York where the memory of the victims and the history and consequences of the attacks are preserved.
The inclusion of both the publication and an example of the artistic work is especially meaningful. It preserves not only the documentation of the project but also a material expression of von Eschenbach’s artistic response.
For the Artforum Culture Foundation and the Winter Stiftung Hamburg, these donations reflect a shared understanding of cultural responsibility: contemporary art can contribute to historical memory across national boundaries and help preserve different perspectives for future generations.
Why the WTC Art Project Matters in 2026
Twenty-five years after 9/11, the central questions of the project remain unresolved.
How do societies respond to profound disruption? How do images shape collective memory? How do destruction and reconstruction alter culture, politics and identity? And how can history remain meaningful once direct personal memory begins to fade?
This is precisely where Monika von Eschenbach’s project gains renewed relevance.
It does not only ask what happened on September 11, 2001. It asks what followed – and what remains.
Seen alongside Wolfgang Staehle’s digital witness and Gerhard Richter’s painterly condensation of 9/11, von Eschenbach occupies a distinctive position: a spatial, multimedia and interdisciplinary exploration of transformation and the long-term aftermath of a historical rupture.
The fact that the project was publicly presented in 2024 and that a publication and representative artwork subsequently found their way to the National September 11 Memorial & Museum in New York gives this artistic dialogue an additional dimension.
What began as an artistic reflection in Germany now forms part of a transatlantic culture of remembrance.
On the 25th anniversary of September 11, this perspective is more relevant than ever:
The project does not only ask us to remember what happened.
It asks what became of it – and what still remains with us today.
September 11, 2001 – September 11, 2026
25 years of remembrance.
Art as memory. Transformation as present. Reflection as responsibility.
Artforum Culture Foundation, in cooperation with the Winter Stiftung Hamburg
Leonardo Safiriou | Peter Merten