2021

Iva Bittová, a Czech violinist, singer and composer is to perform in a concert at Veletržní palác to commemorate liquidation of the so called Theresdienstadt family camp

The Memorial of Silence is pleased to invite you to a musical performance of Iva Bittová that will take place on July 12 at 6 p.m. in the Main Hall at Veletržní palác (Trade Fair Palace). Her music meditation will be dedicated to the memory of the liquidation of the so-called BIIb Theresienstadt family camp in Auschwitz – Birkenau. Free entrance.

The Theresienstadt family camp consisted of a group of Jewish families from the Theresienstadt (Terezín) in Czechoslovakia. Most of the inhabitants of BIIb section who did not die of atrocious conditions were murdered during the camp liquidations on 8 March and 10–12 July 1944. Some 7500 prisoners died, this was the largest mass murder in the history of Czechoslovakia. This liquidation marked the end of false hope given to Jewish families deported to camp since September 1943.

Due to Covid-19 pandemic restrictions it was difficult to organise events in commemoration of March tragic mass murder. Therefore the Memorial of Silence takes this July concert as promising opportunity to return to public space connected to Prague transports.

"Encountering and intertwining with different styles and traditions of different ethnic groups ii a form and reflection of my current musical and personal expression. My musical ideas are based on perceiving and listening to the inner voice and communication with nature. This requires silence, a relaxed mind and a positive atmosphere. All this can then be transferred to a musical free form. Through the listeners I want to send vibrations, new resonances and ideas further into space. The personification of the present at the concert is an important value of a common experience". Iva Bittová

Concert is opening a public dialogue launched by the Memorial of Silence that will commemorate the eighty years since the beginning of Jewish deportations and the founding of the Theresienstadt ghetto. Part of the autumn activities will be for example an exhibition of photographs of the Czech classic photography representative Pavel Dias called Torso, Memories for the Future, organised in cooperation with the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague.

Minister of Culture Lubomír Zaorálek will officially announce the new state-funded organisation the Memorial of Silence at the beginning of the concert. The Memorial of Silence was founded with the main aim to secure reconstruction of the Bubny railway station; this institution will slowly take over the agenda of Bubny Shoah Memorial including its art collections.

The BIIb remembrance is organised by the Monument of Silence in cooperation with the National Gallery in Prague, The Terezín Composers' Institute, the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art and the Jewish Community in Prague. Event is organised under the auspices of the Minister of Culture Lubomír Zaorálek, Councillor for the Culture of the Capital City of Prague Hana Třeštíková and the mayor of Prague 7 Jan Čižinský.

Upon arrival, everyone must prove that one of the following conditions is met:

• Have a negative PCR test not exceeding 7 days old,
• Have a negative POC (so-called antigenic) test not exceeding 72 hours old,
• Have a laboratory confirmation of having recovered from covid-19 disease in the period not longer than 180 days before the day of the event.

Proof of having received the first dose of vaccine against covid-19, at least 22 days before this event, no more than 90 days have passed between the first and second dose and no more than 9 months since the second dose, in the case of a single-dose vaccine, at least 14 days but not more than 9 months must have passed since vaccination.

Starting July 9, everyone with the first dose of the two-dose vaccines still has to have a negative test according to the rules listed above.

In addition, everyone present must have a respirator on at all times without an exhalation valve of min. class FFP2 (KN95 / N95).

The exhibition devoted to the memory of Vendulka Vogelová and her family has arrived to Jerusalem

https://jerusalem.czechcentres.cz/en/program/druhy-zivot-vendulky-v?locale=en

Memorial for BIIb – 8th March 2021

A remembrance event for the Theresienstadt family camp in Auschwitz has taken place on the 8th March at 6pm on Loreta square, Prague. Due to the current situation, the remembrance event took place without public presence and was streamed online.

The event was opened by a miniconcert at the Bubny railway station, which we have prepared in collaboration with mezzo-soprano singer Edita Adlerová and professors and students of the high school Přírodní škola.

The six candles lit in front of the Czernin Palace, the residence of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, were joined by a seventh candle, which was lit at the former lagerhouse BIIb in Birkenau by the director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum Piotr Cywiňski.