In May 2022, we launched a new NeDiPa project: Negotiating Difficult Pasts, which we are implementing together with our partners Fundacja Zapomniane from Warsaw and Urban Memory Foundation from Wrocław thanks to funds from the European Union (CERV – the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values programme).
The NeDiPa project aims to develop a systematic approach to the difficult heritage of the Holocaust in Central and Eastern Europe. Over the next two years, we will implement 29 events – trainings, conferences, commemorations, consultation meetings, artistic initiatives – during which we will develop, together with experts in many fields, DIFFICULT HERITAGE REMEMBRANCE FRAMEWORK, which will include guidelines and recommendations for various groups of recipients and a toolkit for local activists.
In our activities we involve organizations, people and initiatives in the area of remembrance and care for the Jewish heritage in Poland, so that we can continue to work together and that the results of the project benefit the entire community. We will keep you posted about the progress of work and invite you to public events. We encourage you to be in touch with our organizations!
CODE OF CONDUCT 2022-2024
Code of conduct of the consortium and partners and stakeholders of the NeDiPa project 2022-2024 -> READ MORE
OUR projects & events
KICKING OFF THE NEW PROJECT – WARSAW (23.05.2022)
The first meeting of the NeDiPa project: Negotiating Difficult Pasts. It took place on May 23, 2022 at JCC Warsaw. The purpose of the meeting, which took the form of a kick-off for stakeholders, was to present the project to the key organizations, people and initiatives working in the area of remembrance and care for Jewish heritage in Poland. We will work together so that the effects of the project serve all parties that can benefit from it.
We are glad that thanks to the support of the European Commission, we will be able to work in this group for the next two years and cooperate with the network of experts and partners.
The NeDiPa project aims to develop a systematic approach to the difficult heritage of the Holocaust in Central and Eastern Europe.
Over the next two years, together with our partners, FestivALT & Urban Memory Foundation, we will implement 29 events, during which we will develop, together with experts from many fields, DIFFICULT HERITAGE REMEMBRANCE FRAMEWORK. It will include guidelines for various groups of recipients and tool boxes for local activists.
COMMEMORATION IN NOWE TRZCIANO (8.06.2022)
“There are many things I have fear of, freezing cold, gnawing hunger, chronic pain but the most frightening thing for me is oblivion. The idea that after I die nothing will remain of my actions, my dreams, the good and even the bad that I have done. We rely on our families, communities and even the physical places we inhabit to keep our memories alive after we have left this world. The men and a woman who lie here lost all of that. Today we can save them from oblivion” – said on Wednesday, June 8, 2022, Rabbi Yehoshua Ellis during the ceremony of unveiling the monument commemorating the Jewish victims of the Holocaust in the forest in Nowe Trzciano in the Szudzialowo commune (Podlaskie Province).
It was our first memorial ceremony carried out as part of the NeDiPa project: Negotiating Difficult Pasts. We would like to thank our project partners FestivALT & Urban Memory Foundation for their help and support.
Together with the local community, we commemorated the memory of seven men aged around 30 and a woman around 20, Jewish refugees from the Białystok ghetto, murdered in the second half of 1943.
The commemorative ceremony is the result of a fruitful cooperation with the local authorities of the Szudzialowo Commune, Supraśl Forest District and local primary school in Szudziałowo. The ceremony was attended by the representatives of the local government and the authorities of the neighboring communes, representatives of three denominations, young people from the school in Szudziałowo, representatives of Jewish organizations, including the Jewish Religious Community in Warsaw, and most of all the inhabitants of Szudziałowo and the surrounding towns and villages.
ESTHER’S WILLOW IN CHRZANÓW (3.07.2022)
Esther’s Willow is a public project by artists Marta and Katarzyna Sala of Chrzanów and Robert Yerachmiel Sniderman from Philadelphia, whose ancestors lived in Jarosław and Warsaw.
The project concerns the conditions of memory around the former Esther’s Square in Chrzanów, where the Great Synagogue stood until its demolition in 1973, and thereafter a weeping willow grew sometime later. The willow was unexpectedly cut down in 2018. Before the Nazi genocide, Jews made up half of Chrzanów and their history and memory in the city weakens each year.
The central aim of the project was to replant the tree at the site of the synagogue and name it Esther’s Willow, resurfacing the name of the unnamed square now located beside the Municipal Culture, Sport and Recreation Center in Chrzanów.
The gesture of replanting the tree reveals an old, intimate space of transcultural ancestral experience where Jewish and Slavic communities trusted willows in common. In their world, the willow appeared as a tree of power; an antidote to cure viruses, diseases, infertility and bodily pain. As a medium between the living and the dead, the willow can again create a basis and threshold for mutual relations.
This project is created in cooperation with the Irena and Mieczysław Mazaraki Museum in Chrzanów, Municipal Center of Culture, Sports and Recreation (MOKSiR) of Chrzanów, Allianz Kulturstiftung. Co-funded by the Simon Fraser University.
During FestivALT 2022, the Esther Willow planting ceremony and a number of accompanying events took place:
28/06/2022 at 9 PM,
meeting point: CentralALT, Józefińska 9
drawing silent water from the Vistula river
29/06-31/07/2022
exhibition presenting the project Esther’s Willow,
CentrALT, Józefińska 9 street, 30-529 Kraków
02/07/2022, 8.45 PM
meeting point: the former Estera Square in Chrzanów
Silent Water Walk led by artist Śomi
03/07/2022, 11 AM – 1 PM,
meeting place: Chrzanów Główny railway station, ul. Fabryczna
silent procession from the Chrzanów railway station through Aleja Henryka and Rynek to the former Estera Square
03/07/2022, 4.00 PM
Concert of Mojse Band inspired by the body of work of Chrzanow’s Hazzan of the Great Synagogue Hirsch Leib Bakon
On Sunday, July 3rd following a Silent Procession from the Chrzanów railway station through Henryka Boulevard and the Main Square to the former Esther’s Square, a symbolic Willow Sapling named Esther was planted.
The silence was so much more piercing as the musicians walking along in the march carried instruments, which remained silent throughout the march. The Procession symbolically reversed the course of, following the opposite route from the death march of Chrzanów Jews, which then took them to Auschwitz. As soon as the tree was planted, the music sounded in the square.
Video from the event: https://youtu.be/l3GcGd4mxy8
Following the planting the residents of Chrzanów could take part in an outdoor concer of the Slovakian MojšeBand (Michal Palko, František Kubiš, Dolfi Plachetka). Jewish life and memory once again was present in Chrzanów.
The events during FestivALT 2022 were co-funded by the European Commission as part of the “NeDiPa” – Negotiating Difficult Pasts project. The events were realized in partnership with the Zapomniane Foundation and the Urban Memory Foundation.
The project is created in cooperation:
Project archive compilation: Cheong Kin Man
Video, wall text, Dr. Tuszewicki and jar installation translations: Joanna Figiel
Poetry and Reb Nachman translations: Piotr Mierzwa
Translation of Sharon Wasserteil’s letter: Dr. Ewa Wegrzyn
Silent Water harvesting walks created with Śomi Śniegocka
Music for happening: Mojše Band
Special contributions to the project were made by:
Kamil Bogusz, Aneta Drzewiecka, Monika Głuska-Durenkampa-Durenkamp, Jerzy Jura, Eugeniusz Kępiński, Stefania Miarczyńska, Leszek Morawiecki, Joanna Rajkowska, Lena Rubenfeld Koralewska, Anna Sadło-Ostafin, Anna Sala, Wojciech Sala, Szymon Uliasz, Dorota Walczyk, Sharon Wasserteil, Abraham Wasserteil.
About us – Media:
Polish Journal – Gazeta Wyborcza: https://lnkd.in/d_HevqNP
Macau Post Daily: https://lnkd.in/dhqwV-QB
Otwarty Kraków: https://lnkd.in/dchZdiKc
Hoje Macau: https://tinyurl.com/2djky58r
Ponte Final: https://tinyurl.com/2vsnswfw
Tribuna de Macau: https://tinyurl.com/uw4rw4f5
TV Chrzanów: https://youtu.be/wPD5pEof-C4
SAVE THE DATE!
We invite you to join us at one of the project’s upcoming events:
October 12, 2022 Conference: “DIFFICULT HERITAGE. Jewish Breslauers and Other Local Stories, Contexts, and Activities.” -> READ MORE
October 15-16, 2022 Green Commemoration. Action through art.
More info coming soon!