The 2019 guidelines for the Shnurman Visual Arts Contest and the Ida S. Kramer Holocaust Essay Contest are now available online. Feb. 1, 2019 is the deadline for submissions of both contests. See links below to the Quad City student (gr. 7-12 ) contest guidelines.
Harold Kasimow will be the speaker for the May 5, 2019 Yom HaShoah at Temple Emanuel. Photo of Harold Kasimow’s extended family in Turmantas circa 1944-1945.
The exhibition “Architecture of Murder: Auschwitz-Birkenau Blueprints” will be held at Grinnell College (1115 8th Ave, Grinnell, IA) during the first week in April, 2019. More information to be announced. Official exhibition website
ArtsPower will return to the Quad Cities with a production of “My Heart in a Suitcase” on Tuesday, April 30 and Wednesday, May 1, 2019. School venues to be announced.
Summary: Anne Lehmann and her family no longer feel safe in their Berlin home. Life in 1938 Germany is deteriorating quickly for the Lehmanns and all Jews living there. In order to protect their daughter, Mr. and Mrs. Lehmann may have to say goodbye to her forever. Anne must struggle to bring meaning out of despair, to cling to love and hope even in a world that seems filled with hatred and violence. ArtsPower’s gripping and poignant production about Anne and her family’s decision whether or not to send her on the Kindertransport is a tribute to the strength of the human spirit and the enduring power of a family’s love.
The Brundibár opera is coming to Augustana College in November. Performances will be November 16 at 7:30 p.m., and November 17 at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Tickets can be purchased on Augustana’s website.
The Augustana Chamber Orchestra joins Opera@Augustana and the Jenny Lind Vocal Ensemble in a performance of “Brundibár,” a children’s opera by Jewish Czech composer Hans Krása.
“Brundibár” was written in 1938 but was not performed until 1942 when it premiered at the Vinohrady Jewish Boy’s Orphanage in the Prague ghetto.
Krása had already been sent to the Terezín concentration camp where he was the musical director of the Freizeitgestaltung, a group of prisoners tasked with organizing cultural activities for the camp.
When the conductor of the original Prague production was sent to Terezín himself, he smuggled in a piano score to “Brundibár.” From this and his own memory, Krása reconstructed the opera, taking into account the performing forces available to him in the camp.
Beginning with a performance on July 23, 1943, “Brundibár” was performed 55 times in the Terezín camp over the course of the next year and a performance was central to an International Red Cross visit to the camp in June 1944, during which the visiting delegation was deceptively shown a healthy and happy Jewish population.
As the war was nearing its close, Krása was taken on a transport that left Terezín on Oct. 16, 1944, and he was killed in a gas chamber at Auschwitz two days later.
Click on poster to enlarge.