Our grant to the Wende Museum in 2004 supports its preservation of important Soviet era artefacts.

The Museum was founded in 2002 in Los Angeles. It preserves and exhibits social and cultural artefacts, artwork and archives relating to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union during the Cold War era (1945-1991). It is one of the largest known private collections of its kind.

Important artworks and artefacts from this period are under threat. Significant archives continue to be destroyed by former communist elites; statues are still melted down for bronze, and private investors are diverting priceless relics from the public domain.

To reverse these trends, the Museum acquires, analyses, conserves and displays important artefacts and archives for the benefit of scholars and the public. It is hoped this will provide a comprehensive framework for understanding a little studied and largely misrepresented society.

The Museum seeks to go beyond highlighting major political and military events to portray the day-to-day struggles, outlooks and interactions of citizens in communist Europe (with special emphasis on East Germany). The collection reveals how social behaviour could be moulded by pervasive propaganda and used by public and quasi-public organisations both to inspire and to intimidate. It shows propaganda campaigns, (featuring rituals and ceremonies, banners, political gifts and politicised consumer goods), and how individuals, in turn, used these official symbols and devices to maintain and advance their own positions in the community.

In its first year the Museum won praise from scholars and established museums for preserving and restoring many artefacts that would otherwise have been lost to deterioration and vandalism.

This success and a further grant of US$ 991,500 has allowed the Museum to expand its collection, fund an extra archivist to maintain it, provide extra storage space and create a central database for the collection.