Zu Hause und doch fremd ("At home and yet foreign")

At the end of the Second World War, millions of Germans in Germany's eastern territories had to leave their homeland; some fled, while others were forced to leave due to the Potsdam Agreement. They were driven from their homes and villages and were left without belongings in an environment completely alien to them. Here they were often received reluctantly; there was hunger, unemployment and a shortage of housing. This was a difficult time for both the displaced newcomers and the locals.
 
The abandoned regions were soon repopulated by displaced Poles from the eastern territories, Polish prisoners of war and forced laborers returning home, or settlers from central Poland. It was a heterogeneous group and everyone arrived with different expectations – many of them not voluntarily – in partly destroyed towns and villages that had a distinctly German character. The country was foreign and the future uncertain. This loss of homeland and sense of uprootedness deeply affected people from both nations as well as their descendants.

Those affected dealt differently with the sometimes traumatic experiences that came with escape and expulsion, with uncertainty, uprootedness, and the loss of home. Some repressed the experiences, others tried to keep the memory alive; in some families there was much talk about it, in others the topic was a taboo; some became involved in compatriotism or in the local community and cultivated the old traditions, while others sought connection in their new homeland by joining associations and church communities; there are also those who never went back to their homeland and those who today maintain close contacts in their old hometown. These very different ways of dealing with one's own past and the memories of flight and expulsion are presented in the exhibition. This is done from very different perspectives, which allows for a differentiated view of the issue. In addition to the perspective of the expelled Germans, the situation of the Poles who settled in Silesia is also considered, as well as the point of view of the West German population, who received the so-called refugees from the east. Last but not least, the exhibition explores how the descendants of the displaced people have been affected and looks at their relationship to their ancestors' old homeland and to the topic of expulsion.
 
The bilingual German-Polish exhibition is a joint project developed in cooperation with the Muzeum Powiatowe in Nysa, the Muzeum Ceramiki (Museum of Ceramics) in Bolesławiec, the Muzeum Ziemi Lubuskiej (Museum of the Lubusz Land) in Zielona Góra, and the Muzeum Regionalne (Regional Museum) in Środa Śląska. With its bi-national approach, the project aims to create a new and more comprehensive exhibition that can be seen in Germany and Poland and to contribute to mutual understanding by seeking to clarify for each nation the viewpoint of the other.