The Nazi Camp Commandant’s House as a Space of Complicity: Understanding Art at Atrocity Sites – the Case of Falstad, Norway

The article examines the role of art at sites of atrocity heritage. Its case in point is the temporary art exhibition 'Perpetrator Perspectives' (2022–2023), which the Norwegian Nazi camp memorial, the Falstad Centre, commissioned to exhibit in its former commandant’s house. Through a close reading of the exhibition’s recurring commandant’s house motif, I argue that the Nazi camp commandant’s house becomes a space of complicity – a many-layered topographic matrix where an embodied visitor participates in shaping perpetrator memory through engaging with the space’s meanings as home, crime scene, and memorial space. In a concluding remark, I suggest potentials and pitfalls for visitor engagement in perpetrator memory in such a space of complicity.