''Wrapped Reichstag, Project for Berlin'' was a 1995 environmental artwork in which artists

Christo and Jeanne-Claude Christo Vladimirov Javacheff (1935–2020) and Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon (1935–2009), known as Christo and Jeanne-Claude, were artists noted for their large-scale, site-specific environmental installations, often large landmarks and ...

wrapped the Berlin

Reichstag building The Reichstag (, ; officially: – ; en, Parliament) is a historic government building in Berlin which houses the Bundestag, the lower house of Germany's parliament. It was constructed to house the Imperial Diet (german: Reichstag) of the ...

in fabric.

History

A German citizens' group unsuccessfully advocated for the project in 1978 but the building, which held deep German national identity symbolism prior to

reunification A political union is a type of political entity which is composed of, or created from, smaller polities, or the process which achieves this. These smaller polities are usually called federated states and federal territories in a federal governmen ...

, required unavailable political will.

Rita Süssmuth Rita Süssmuth ( ''née'' Kickuth; ; born 17 February 1937) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). She served as the 10th President of the Bundestag. From 1985 to 1988, she served as Federal Minister for Youth, Family ...

, the newly-elected

President of the Bundestag The president of the Bundestag (german: Präsident des Deutschen Bundestages or ) presides over the sessions of the Bundestag, the federal parliament of Germany, with functions similar to that of a speaker in other countries. In the German orde ...

, expressed interest in the project in 1989, precipitating its approval. The project had been rejected three times across six Bundestag presidents and 24 years before its 1994 vote for approval. ''Wrapped Reichstag'' mounted in 1995 for two weeks as 100,000 square meters of silver fabric draped the building and fastened with blue rope. The Reichstag, which had not been in use, was later reconstructed for parliamentary use in 1999. Christo described the Reichstag wrapping as autobiographical. It became symbolic of unified Germany and marked Berlin's return as a world city. ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

'' posthumously described the work as the pair's "most spectacular achievement".

Notes

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * * Christo und Jeanne-Claude: ''Wrapped Reichstag. Berlin 1971–95''. Taschen, Köln 2002, . * Jacob Baal-Teshuva (Hrsg.): ''Christo, der Reichstag und urbane Projekte''. Prestel, München 1993, . * Jacob Baal-Teshuva: ''Christo & Jeanne-Claude'', mit Fotografien von Wolfgang Volz, Benedikt Taschen Verlag, Köln 1995. . * Burt Chernow: ''XTO + J-C''. List, München 2002, . * Henning Ritter: ''Die Liebe der Massen zur Kunst. Christos Triumph''. 1995. In: ''Die Wiederkehr der Wunderkammer. Über Kunst und Künstler'', Hanser, Berlin 2014, S. 240–247.

External links

{{Authority control 1995 works Works by Christo and Jeanne-Claude 1995 in Berlin Reichstag building