Holocaust remembered v
Theatre, art, music and film pay tribute. Words: Ruth Hedges
ifty-eight years ago on 27
January the concentration
camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau were liberated. The date is now commemorated annually by the Holocaust Memorial Day and. after previous events in London and Manchester, is this year being held in Edinburgh.
Since its inception in 2000. the festival has had a different focus each year: this time it is children. In the 12 years of Nazi rule between 1933 and 1945 it is estimated that at least 1.5 million children were murdered. The programme devised by Edinburgh City Council and the Holocaust Educational Trust to document this encompasses theatre. art. music, films. talks. lectures and a programme for schools to use in conjunction with events.
'As the years go on there‘s fewer survivors and each generation doesn't get taught a great deal about it so we feel that we wanted to use this to work with schools and look to the future,‘ says project organiser Martin Hutchison.
The programme. which includes a lecture by journalist Fergal Keane and exhibition by survivor Marianne Grant.
blends remembrance with the present.
were trying to address what‘s happening in people's own communities and schools in terms of looking at the whole range of prejudice. discrimination and racism around us.‘ says Hutchison. ‘How does it relate to us today?’
This is an issue which artist Marianne Grant feels passionately about. Grant. from the age of 18 to 23, endured six years in forced labour and concentration camps. What do the sketches she made while in camps mean to her? ‘They’re just memories.‘ she says. 'I remember everything. yes.‘
Stories such as these are crucial. “I feel the young ones should be educated, even from the age of primary school, and sh0uld know what has happened,‘ says Grant. ‘There shouldn’t be any prejudices whatsoever. We always have to remember that.’
Other events include a screening of / was a Slave Labourer and performances. incorporating readings and dance, of All our Futures. the play adapted from survivor Ernest Levy's autobiography, Just One More Dance.
See listings and Edinburgh Life .'_:_ _. I; . , for further details. tee-as; a: amt-i .
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16—30 Jan 2003 THE LIST 7