Alan Turnbull: The Dresden Archive Project at German Historical Institute London

The Dresden Archive Project, a work by artist Alan Turnbull, is an act of remembrance of the Dresden that was lost in a firestorm at the end of the Second World War. The archive itself is a collection of images which celebrate the city's history. It includes postcards, photographs and printed ephemera relating to Dresden, beginning around 1870 when Saxony still had its own King, and ending in the 1950s , with Dresden, a ruined city, passing into Soviet control. Close scrutiny of even routine-looking postcards can reveal figures emerging from the shadows, faces peeping out of windows, or a human presence largely hidden and obscured in a retouched photograph. These are the incidental traces of life which bring poignancy to these images, a poignancy which is increased by knowledge of the changes that were to come.