PHILADELPHIA -- The German Democratic Republic disappeared more suddenly and more completely than any state in modern times. Beginning the weekend of Nov. 6, the 15th anniversary of those events, the Arthur Ross Gallery offers a visual recollection and a contribution to the understanding of that vanished state.

The exhibition features the work of distinguished East German photographer Lutz Masanetz, who was born in Kirschau/Spree and moved to Berlin in 1953.  "GILB: Yellowed Images of a Vanished Country. Photographs from East Germany by Lutz Masanetz" will be on display through Jan. 30, 2005 at the Arthur Ross Gallery, 220 S. 34th St., Philadelphia.

The Arthur Ross Gallery is open Tuesday-Friday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m., and Saturday-Sunday, noon-5 p.m.  Exhibitions are free and open to the public.

The exhibition will be the opening event for a conference, The Long Shadow of the Berlin Wall, Nov. 5-7, organized by the Penn's departments of History and German, with cooperation from Penn's European Studies Program, which brings together scholars from Germany, the US, Poland and the Czech Republic.  They will examine the reasons for the collapse of the GDR and look at the way eastern Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic have coped with the end of the communist regimes and the subsequent transformations of their societies and political systems.  

Information about the conference is available by calling Deborah Broadnax at 215-898-8452 or at www.history.upenn.edu/Conference2004/conference2004.htm.  

Additional information about the exhibition is available at 215-898-2083 or www.upenn.edu/ARG/.

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