114. Bulgaria Doesn’t Have A Museum of Communism. That Might Be Changing Soon.

About this episode

Thirty-seven years after the collapse of Bulgaria's communist regime, the country still doesn’t have an interpretive museum about the period. But even if one existed, I know Bulgarians who would never visit, confident that a museum of communism would be an endorsement of the regime. Political scientist Louisa Slavkova, founder of the Sofia Platform Foundation, is hoping to solve both problems with Facade, a new museum set to open in Sofia in 2028. The name points to the gap between the regime's promises and its human cost. In this episode, Slavkova describes how her team's work at the former Belene concentration camp gave them the confidence to build a museum, the first version of the museum inside a converted bus in time for Eurovision 2027, and how Facade will make room for a full range of Bulgarian’s memories without treating those memories as a verdict on the regime. Image: The building of the future Facade museum in Sofia, Bulgaria. Topics and Notes • 00:00 Welcome to Museum Archipelago • 00:15 Bulgaria's Missing Museum • 00:57 Inside the Museum of Socialist Art • 02:14 Louisa Slavkova and the Sofia Platform Foundation • 03:27 After the Fall of Communism • 0