International Conference “BETWEEN APATHY AND NOSTALGIA: Public and Private Recollections of Communism in Contemporary Albania” Institute for Democracy, Media & Culture in partnership with Konrad Adenauer Foundation * From a research conducted for my master’s thesis on difficult memory in Albania, under the supervision of Mrs Andromachi Gkazi, Assistant Professor at the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences. Remembering the communist past in Albania: The case of Bunk Art Project* Abstract After the fall of the Berlin Wall, each of the formerly communist states of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), depending on historical, political and geographical factors, have followed their own path of change and political transformation, by constructing new identities in terms of liberal, pluralist and democratic ideals, for both internal and external use. Although they tried to leave behind their communist past, seems that it continue to preoccupy them, until today. Focusing on the case of Albania and by using the notion of memory as my main analytical tool, I investigate the muzealization process of the former anti-nuclear bunker of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the so-called BunkArt, seen as a triplet project with BunkArt2 and the House of Leafs, which is under construction. In particular, by conducting in depth interviews with the embedded agents, I study the way in which has been constructed a sense of past experience in this very case, by examining both the content and the processes of preservation and transfer of memory in the course of its museology and the chosen representative strategies during the making of history. What I argue is that the new emerged attitude of Albania in order to deliver its communist past, may be considered more as an imported urge and need for re- formulation and re-construction of its cultural memory, in line with the transnational trend of heritagization from below and elevation of nostalgia, given certain economic and touristic perspective, thus to meet the needs of the present and to fit to the new Albanian identity. _______________________________________ Alsena Kokalari received a bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of Pireaus and a master’s degree in Cultural Management from Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences in Athens, Greece. Her research interests include the study of culture and ideology in the CEE countries, focusing on the case of Albania. Contact: alsena.kokalari@gmail.com, +30 6986121282