Saturday, November 21, 2009

Commemorating

A new job is waiting for me, one that is very valuable to me and I feel honoured to do it. The district parliament of a part of Hamburg commemorates the victims of the 3rd Reich every year on January 27, and I am to do the picture show for the background of the reading. What will be read by some members of parliament are documents about the lives of a few citizens of Hamburg who were deported or in another way victims of their political conviction, their confession, their roots. You may have heard about the "Stolpersteine", small brass panels with the name and life data of these citizens, applied on the pavement in front of the houses where they lived.
There is some controversy about them. Tell me what you think.

12 comments:

Pat said...

i did not know the word stolpersteine. so i visited wikipedia to learn more .... and found there are more than 1800 such memorials in hamburg by the homes in which they lived.

will you write more about what you will be doing with the picture show. will it be digital. or painting.

what a wonderful effort to contribute to. i want to say 'how fortunate you are' and then i thought, 'no'. it is not about luck; it is about your talent.

congratulations on such a meaningful endeavor.

please keep up informed....

Robbie said...

I too didn't know what the word 'Stolpersteine' was. I was touched in reading some of the sites via google. You should be honored to be part of this recognition. Let us not forget any of the victims of wars....congrats for being part of this.

Eva said...

Pat, the show will consist of photographs and documents. In some cases we don't have a photo of the person; so we can just show pictures of places at that time and today. And there will be reproduced letters, tax cards, administration documents etc.

Deborah said...

Congratulations, what an honor for you!

ArtSparker said...

These efforts at communal memory are all to the good - if only we could make this part of our internal wiring, what war really means. The best thing as a creative, to have work that really engages one. And this in particular, almost as if you were a modern day shaman.

Beate Knappe said...

Ich finde die Idee der Stolpersteine einfach großartig und ich verstehr die Kritiker nicht!!!
I love the Idea of "Stolpersteine", in Germany we have this in same citys

Chris Gray said...

I think it helps people to remember .....

....and that can only be good.....


Unfortunately, history has a habit of repeating itself and at least if the memories are kept alive, there's a chance that it won't be allowed to happen again.

What an honour to be part of this.

x Chris

Anonymous said...

All of us are in need of those "Stolpersteine":
just to remind us what happens if we allow other people (or ourselves !) to treat people who are, or behave differently, not as nice as we should !! Els.

Phyllis said...

What an honor. I was not familiar with this word,"Stolpersteine" either. It is so important to recall the past and remember it and remind ourselves, lest we forget.

Rayna said...

Never again.

Bozena said...

What a great idea! It's the best we can do for them - to remember them as one of us, real people with "bones and blood" and not as anonymus victims.
Congratulations for being a part of this great project!

Guzzisue said...

we noticed some of these near our Hotel when we stayed over last year, thank you for explaining what they are.