The exhibition uses 20 impressive posters to illuminate the realities of life for women in the Federal Republic and the GDR in the 1970s and 1980s. It shows how differently - and yet often surprisingly similarly - women in both German states organised their everyday lives, fulfilled their roles and fought for freedom. Common clichés are scrutinised in the process.
The Western woman is often described as either a "homebody at the cooker" or a tough career woman. Eastern women, on the other hand, "stand their ground" in coal mining. She is described as tough or as a raven mother because she puts her children in a crèche. The western woman genders, while the eastern woman doesn't know what to do with it. Eastern women are sometimes seen as losers, sometimes as winners of German unity. The list of attributions is long. Although some of them are grotesquely contradictory, they all testify to the conviction that we know exactly what makes THE Eastern woman and THE Western woman tick.
Where do these attributions come from? And what is there to them? The exhibition "Women in Divided Germany" aims to answer these questions. The aim of the exhibition is to make the diverse experiences of women visible and to show the similarities and differences between the realities of life in Germany. At the same time, the exhibition raises the question of whether women in both German states shared a common striving for self-determination in a male-dominated system, despite the different political and social conditions.
Further information is available at Vernissage zur Ausstellung "Frauen im geteilten Deutschland" / haldensleben.de or from Mrs Katja Klommhaus (Tel.: 03904- 7240 1301 / E-Mail: gleichstellung(at)landkreis-boerde.de.