Practices of Restitution: Law and Aesthetics in Modern Germany
Practices of Restitution: Law and Aesthetics in Modern German
10 February 2026 (Tuesday)
17:00
Room 901, 9/F, Cheng Yu Tung Tower, HKU
Since the end of the Second World War, restitution in Germany – Wiedergutmachung – has been mainly understood as part of state or private law. This book offers a different approach, arguing that authors and artists have also taken up a responsibility for restitution. Deploying the literal translation ‘making-good-again’, this book focuses on the ‘making’ of law, literature and visual art to argue that restitution is a practice which is found in different genres, sites and temporalities. The practices of restitution identified are dynamic, iterative and incomplete: they are practices of failure. Nevertheless, in this book, the question of how to conduct restitution emerges as a material question of responsibility asked through the making of texts and objects in different genres, including law. The resulting text is a unique expansion and re-conceptualisation of the practices of jurisprudence, restitution and responsibility in the context of the aftermath in Germany.
Prior registration is required for this in-person event: https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_hdetail.aspx?guest=Y&ueid=104547
For Inquiries, please contact Max Hsu at .
For Inquiries, please contact Max Hsu at .