HHD Foundation: Congratulations on your new role. What motivated you to take on this task?
Ruth Ur: My connection to the Exilmuseum dates back to 2018, when I was appointed to the board. This gave me the opportunity to get to know the project in depth at an early stage, and close personal relationships developed with founding director Christoph Stölzl and our patron Herta Müller. After Christoph Stölzl’s death, I asked the project’s initiator, Bernd Schultz, how he envisioned the future of the museum. He said to me: Now you must make the Exilmuseum a reality. I nearly fell off my chair, because Christoph Stölzl was someone I greatly admired. This trust, as well as the substantive importance of the project, deeply moved me. For me, there is no more meaningful task than contributing to the realisation of this museum. Exile is such an important topic today, and I believe we can learn a great deal from the past. This museum has an important role in society, and I can hardly wait to open our doors.
HHD Foundation: You speak of doors. Is it true that you will open the museum on Fasanenstraße in Berlin-Charlottenburg, rather than realise the planned new building at Anhalter Bahnhof?
Ruth Ur: First of all: yes! The world has changed fundamentally. Since 2020, we have experienced not only the Covid pandemic, but also Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, as well as the war in Israel and Palestine. Overall, we are seeing economic uncertainty in Germany, drastic cuts to culture and growing political challenges. Under these circumstances, I am convinced that we must be even more ambitious on the one hand, but also act pragmatically and realistically on the other. In English, we say: A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush – what one has for certain is worth more than what is merely in prospect.
A new building in such a symbolically significant location would of course be extraordinary. But at this point in time, I cannot guarantee that the 120 million euros required for it can be raised. At the same time, we have this wonderful building on Fasanenstraße, which was once already a museum and which, I am convinced, can become a very special place with comparatively manageable investment. From Charlottenburg, the Exilmuseum will work with partner institutions around the world and develop a diverse programme.
HDD Foundation: How compatible do you consider the juxtaposition of exile stories from past eras, for example the period of National Socialism, and contemporary biographies?
Ruth Ur: From the very beginning, the Exilmuseum’s mission was to shine a light on those people who found themselves forced to leave their homeland under National Socialism. Given what happened to those who stayed, the fate of those who were able to flee understandably often recedes into the background. Yet the experience of leaving one’s old life and familiar surroundings behind and building a new existence in another country, culture and language is, tragically, not a phenomenon limited to times past, but part of the human experience to this day. It is important to understand the circumstances that prompt people to take this step, and what it means to live in exile. The challenge for my team and me is therefore to tell historical stories in such a way that they not only make the past comprehensible, but also illuminate our present. What does it mean when people have to leave their homeland in order to live in safety? What happens when a journalist can no longer publish without being threatened? What is it like to live between the memory of one’s old homeland and settling into a new one? These questions are highly relevant today for many people around the world. That is why it is important to us that, alongside the historical narrative, our museum also gives space to these contemporary experiences.
HHD Foundation: Anhalter Bahnhof was both a place from which people set out into exile and one of the three deportation sites in Berlin from which thousands were taken to concentration camps. What significance does this place hold for the Exilmuseum Foundation if the museum is not built there?
Ruth Ur: Anhalter Bahnhof is part of our DNA. It is a place that had long been forgotten and that must be brought back into public awareness. That is why we recently launched a new programme there to draw attention to this site and keep its history alive. It began with the light installation I Don’t Have Another Land by the artist Nathan Coley. What is special about this work for me is that it is deliberately open to multiple interpretations. For three months, throughout the Berlin winter, the text installation illuminated the remaining portal of Anhalter Bahnhof. We are now preparing the next artistic interventions. All of this was made possible by the generous support of the Heinz and Heide Dürr Foundation and Deutsche Bahn.
HHD Foundation: You have also launched an educational programme. Can you briefly describe why you started it and the role it plays in the development of the future museum?
Ruth Ur: I always say: if you succeed in inspiring children, you have a good chance of reaching their siblings and families as well. Since September 2025, we have been running workshops for primary school classes. The children come to us for a day and engage creatively with the biographies of people who had to go into exile during National Socialism. They spend the whole day here and have lunch together as well. They come from different districts, from the neighbourhood as well as from so-called disadvantaged schools. It is important to us to create an open and welcoming atmosphere and to give the children space to discover connections between these life stories and their own experiences. It is sometimes loud and lively, and honestly, I cannot imagine anything more wonderful at the moment.