Reading performance & discussion with Berlin author and poet Esther Dischereit together with Jonny Ball.
In 2023, Esther Dischereit created an exhibition in cooperation with Deutsche Bahn to honour the railroad worker Fritz Kittel. In 1944 and 1945, he hid her mother Hella and sister Hannelore, who as Jews were persecuted by the Gestapo and threatened with death in Germany under National Socialism. They were liberated by U.S. troops in 1945. Dischereit began to search for the family of the rescuer and found them in 2019. Fritz Kittel had not told his own family about his courageous act throughout his life.
Esther Dischereit’s literary response in 17 text pieces includes other found objects from the lives of her mother, sister, and Fritz Kittel, and they offer a dialogue with those who are now the daughters and sons or grandchildren. False information given at a registration office, illegal names and addresses … What do we read when we read these documents? What do we see when we look at these photos?
Esther Dischereit lives in Berlin, writes prose, poems, essays, and radio works. She is considered one of the most important voices of Jewish literature in Germany in the second generation after the Shoah. She was honoured with the prestigious Erich Fried Prize for her work in 2009. She was a professor at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna from 2012 to 2017 and held a chair in contemporary poetics at NYU in 2019. Among her most recent publications and projects Hab keine Angst! Erzähl alles. Das Attentat von Halle und die Stimmen der Überlebenden (Ed., 2020); Sometimes a Single Leaf (2020) and Flowers for Otello On the Crimes that Came out of Jena (2022) – both translated by Iain Galbraith, as well as Wer war Fritz Kittel, Exhibition 2023: Berlin / Frankfurt am Main / Chemnitz / Nürnberg.
Lecture recorded at Senate House, London on Tuesday, February 6, 2024 – 18:00
Images from the lecture, and other streaming links, are available on the Leo Baeck Institute London website:https://www.leobaeck.co.uk/events/special-events/who-was-fritz-kittel-german-railway-worker-decides-1933-2022
This lecture is a collaboration between the Leo Baeck Institute London and the Goethe-Institut London.
Poster photo credits: ©Abraham Pissarek, ©Katrin Hammer / Deutsche Bahn AG, ©Katrin Hammer / Deutsche Bahn AG
Good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is Joseph Cronin I’m be director of the Leo Institute London this evening we’re delighted to be hosting a talk in collaboration with the Gerta Institute London I think maybe the first but hope first of many and our speaker tonight is none other than the
Esteemed German Jewish writer and activist Esther dite um Esa dite is what you might call in German aish k um public figure uh a list of achievements in a career spanning four decades um is Legion and varied and I will restrict myself to uh mentioning just a few highlights um
Esther was born and grew up in Germany in the aftermath of the Holocaust uh um her mother was a Survivor we’ll hear more about that this evening um she studied in Frankfurt online uh and initially trained to be a teacher however due to her participation in the political arrest of
1968 she was prevented from teaching in public schools and she then worked as a types Setter in print shops whilst nurturing a literary Talent it was during the 1980s that she became a full-time writer and as since published across a range of genres novels collections of poems
Essays uh and she’s also written for theater and for radio um those of Works include the novel y Tiel known as ha published in 1988 Darin published in 1992 um the morning with the paper boy a collection of thought stories published in uh 2007 and much else
Besides eser has been a fellowed at the Moses mendleson Center for European and Jewish studies and writer and Residence at oand College at Conservatory in I think Ohio uh in 2009 she was awarded Austria’s prestigious area fre to prize for her outstanding contributions to literature as say poems meanwhile have appeared in
Publications around the world uh including in this newspaper no z c the magazines Audra in Poland elali in astina and proo in Colombia um so without further Ado please join me in welcoming es dis rides this evening is going to explore a subject of very personal residence who was tritz K
Thought that it’s going to say a few words yeah good evening everybody the problem is we second speak first we had set all on our what’s that uh maybe just to to to welcome you again from our site as my name is SP bman and I am the program director of G
Institute here in London and we had the privilege Shing already um a week ago at our premise if you miss that chance but tonight uh we have you and had another privilege that um I think a year ago um we had in tour together through the exhibition that we will uh speak about
Today um by that time it was in the Berlin Museum of um transport a huge Museum where you have all these cool classes I’m sure there’s something similar in all that and your and there was your your exhibition and we to walk a little while because it will not let
Say on the front that been human that’s some story that you might mention today and if you came here to hear a reading session I think I can tell you that um it will probably not be a reading session but more something like um something
Like um and you’re not doing long I also say hello uh to you J B some PhD student from kangri from Jesus college kangri is said right yeah um and um it happens by chance that the upic of your phdp and is has Dr so
Here’s than to all uh me thank you very much um Leo Back Institute for uh this cooperation and Senate house our first time here so enjoy the evening thanks that’s yeah is to everybody thank you for whether they back intitute well in in one or the other way
The Institute became invol in my Pro which you might not know in Long ter but I happen to have um a former student on my when I was teaching a VI wor Viet she did an internship at the newor Back Institute in New York and kept contact and then I started talk about
Rste killer and all of a sudden she she reached out to me say listen I found some who did she did you know that your grandparents that on your story so so this enriched me surely very much getting to nors I know before wife that’s K and King in 2009 in I think
You realize that we just had the celebration for the 85th Anniversary of the king ofs and it took light a gr of the Kingdom transort King and their descendants and had the wish to travel to Europe and to see the places May in l s where they they met
That they was their parents mainly seeing them last time and uh at the same time I been shareits at NYU and was living together with a PR name V we just had the pleasure to um on panel with with me at the G Institute and it turned
Out that she’s president of the K in Father Association it’s great about the kind worldwide and the standards and yeah reaching out um and and I figured out that manissa was trying to get in contact with German institutions or German speak instit as far as I saw it in Austria in
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Since R we decided to tr to the places where it all had or to to try to find out could we Rel this yeah couldn’t actually see the places like then then again which who accompanied us with it with it beos and right from the beginning on I insisted
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And I do not how to call the story because I have to know the story I mean it’s not my jointy to to say it’s really true I’m I’m not on Criminal Court yeah so I I came I choose to um to go this way that
He where I can be much more free to articulate thoughts from today it’s the base of the exent and from there on I add documents and I read photographs and I’m going to look what what is missing what should be should be Tau what can can be Tau and what cannot
Be all and yeah now I’m here to present you because exu itself is not available for you now uh but present with bunch of the 17 pieces you don’t do that all you really very C to it and um yeah so having this a little bit B what was
Sliding front of your eyes um you can follow now the SPs which came out searching for it’s kill the person at the time no one of us knew and we never get Tom more and text number one reading back for study at every page Waste Paper entries in the diary for a
Previous year you probably couldn’t get one for the current year the page you keep wondering about is this page you not about and J of my mother and my sister it all that correct my mother gave he saying in conversation from why he do this why is it his
Head ising is he writing this St in the M sted PO is he writing it down in the St the if worned without and did she know then was she part of after all and the men to denounce when there last name a from from one of those Refuge but
How does he know about him what’s this question about the play instead the pain or reproach when my mother if be carrying mes or not she something else that she might have pred had were but about at least this this is what fins the family with then in going through the documents
In F number to talk did talk very that how we are and Sten doesn’t know what we are looking for she can choose the Pap conversation was St put in his publication he said then is used to be the that never get B and in
Back I don’t know so may that I be another side and that side would have wanted to inherit something of it w not much not much of no we are all Ds and Dam she pictures the te top sh SP the golden exraction in go trip from W it’s in
In on in a living room the say CS were also C in the local and they are EV where exhibit with the w of the J and face let you see whenever talks at me he wa to the car and help there a GU there with b and a few
Li and sister the D was sitting iner and held they father their mother workday and the brother missed it as not come back from the war I thought we could those maybe could had back with my mother or just sister and maybe that there could be a nothing was
Found like around with children they all tried to touch the tips of their noes with their par sping her th laughing with te cup all work out the table clo there’s another one ping May plus X now say last we I was on here where the book I is R light course personal
Station your this look like it was father it’s and iMed said father never under those circumstances did ever read when iated the book he said outside and treated I took sweet B flowers on that stop with me but the present for FR and my wallets in up jacket with a
Locker I told my with me the way to come back in in long time everyone spending over oops and notes and letters there is nobody here asked about the blood they so CL by order it the book with WR such such b place or after one or two days I
Can’t this one here it’s in transit did I see the Dos no I didn’t it’s in transit I said now unaging that the of work or the was never and which was this for them I’m not want to read this and brle paper which smell the go HD r b open page
S the f female Rhythm the 28 day cycle casses Soul equals life Spirit feeling sexuality the multiplicity of life but also it’s interior mutation the remaking of the person 14 days of high drive always alternate with the m male Rhythm the 23-day cycle compasses the male drive for
Action the P primitive Rhythm the 18-day cycle it has nine days of high drive and then nine days of low Drive between the high and the low we find a minus curve the half periodic day and in contrast between low and high 0 point I.E the beginning of a new period the
Stronger minus curve the periodic day I’m sure P wa in the ad Pages page 20 health and sickness fertility conception Love and Marriage I count for the church from right to left we from left to right that brings to M way that Mak expect with or without words where was
Encoded you already know it l your ch Tex number four my mother is sitting at the kitchen table on the table legs the paint has flaked off in places the white has yellowed the table had eight legs so she could Stow the dirty dishes inside the embedded wooden frame which concealed an enamel
Bowl this inset could be pulled out and pushed back like a drawer she often sat here drinking a cup of coffee the paper filters were made by Mita sometimes together with voud vad was the best friend from school of my sister hannaa my oldest sister who had left home already and was
Studying languages somewhere far away when the two of them talked sometimes I was supposed to go out and well play maybe I stayed standing behind the half closed door or sat on the floor in the corridor it must have been on one of these days that I first had the name Fritz
Kle text number five I visited the state Archive of B the files of the Berlin Brandenburg Department of Finance were held there 1990s after the fall of the war was my research in the course of academic interest no it was personal very personal I was fulfilling elen’s
Wish like my mother she was from Berlin and like my mother she had survived as a Jew her friend Felisa hadn’t she had asked me to ser for the truth about her fate day after day I had come back getting bought down in those files a caretaker denounced a Jewish Family a
Neighbor let it be known that she was interested in the flat whenever they would go away at last and yes the electricity company cut off the supply sir are you making progress the arabist asked I looked at him he let me make copies I came back wanted to leave never come back
Again halfway out facing the door I turned back once again and said but if you could find these papers then my grandparents must have a file here too and my mother and her first husband and my oldest sister the child of that marriage I said then
Names he looked them up in a big fat book they’re listed here in the book of the Jews of Berlin they’re dead I said no they’re not dead I can witness that the arabist said that meant he could delete their names from the book of the murdered Jews of Berlin I said
Yes he said when have I even once been able to do this before in all these last decades actually never he fetched a pen text number six the one room tailoring Workshop a woman was employed to work there a chrisan when my grandparents have to go
Into hiding she takes them in with her unfortunately this working woman is sometimes as they say not right in the head then she shouts obscenities about Hitler up and down the stairwell that’s why they couldn’t stay there wrote my grandfather I can’t remember whether that was the Leo reports in New York
Which Catalina had found for me that that somebody called the gape and Drew their attention to the family in my grandparents had to get a away I would like to know her name the woman’s name is not recorded anywhere text number seven Sonia’s story puzzled me for a long
Time at Thanksgiving 10 years ago at my nieces in Chicago we were sitting around the table and and waiting for the turkey to be served when the phone ran someone picked up and passed the receiver to Hann order it was one of those devices out of fashion now which
Always sits on a charging station it’s for you I heard her irritated phrases fragments of words oh my goodness that’s wonderful and where I and you was New York I did believe this but still she said she had to H to hang up the turkey the family and hung
Up who was this person in their 80s from New York she was talking to she was part of the household says hanura and nothing more there are photos of a girl of about eight playing with a little three-year-old girl Sonia was a child who’d been taken into
Their Care by my grandparents bold and Rosa her parents lived in zoral a good way from Berlin they traded in textiles and were hardworking business people both of them from the end of 1938 the children could no longer attend State schools the parents gave their children also including Sonia’s brother Hines
Over to foster parents the brother that way the sister to my grandparents in Berlin who looked after her well and made sure she could attend the Jewish Primary School nearby English was her favorite subject the school was in the synagogue in rastra and Sonia could walk there from the grandparents
Home until she changed schools later and took the Tran she came home about five after a long school day Sonia’s son lives in New York with his mother Oliver found him find them both he’s forever finding undiscovered members of the family where was Sonia when our grandparents went to Legal Jay says he
Knows his grandmother era Goldberg had come to Berlin and taken little Sona away with her when I came out of school she was there we have to go right now Sonia didn’t want to asked why her mother said she’d tell her once they got to the railway the schools were closed by the
National socialists in 1942 Sonia says she was sitting on a farm in zal by her mother she has fun memories of our grandparents and then that Journey that journey to Zoro in 1943 where mother and child hel and Han hanur Zacharias in December register under false names as living at
Schat with either goldbeard but can’t stay there so they deregister then at Zid with the Shad family then in he at lared B with Fritz kle did they get to know Fritz kle through the gold Bears we send this on your photos a photo of britz kle when he was
Younger her son Jay says he doesn’t want to upset her whenever she’s asked about those times she gets sick I ask her about her favorite teacher in the school in rikasa her favorite subject and whether she has a best friend her son will pass these questions on to her in
English he has an ad J he will do it he says when he thinks it will be all right you can talk much than not work did the talk much like his teats and quiet it man who likes hiss and quiet himself but this watch he always s
It on him did you only wear it of s the gold words with the CH I had to ask more was surely to be taken work with them every day with this little rainway station out building where the ENT but probably nowadays no CH of brunes for home around
Mday and a thoughtful 6 years old she left and send off on all with a large Bo ready sh with SC for weing birs bu into theide we away the and found tool foring sing backwards an old shov as old as the B into cin house and rway Flash C the iceway with
Disat when he arrived here the chice of Liv and already grown or to me and murder this job was sh on Lo contactor the pment it’s WR SH no contactor then what was it she was loading in the last weeks of the war why would he transer me to this spot
On ver I never apprach be the said and cen’s mother sweep out the bed on the ground like all here part of a period go would be given verying you near near M where and what until the that could arise again from the dead and dig it up then me then
You R hard M and sectoring the an company now in their only way but people were still needed to dispatch Friends check loads and labeling and release them onto the V which were rtion parted on Words let K wrote in his notebook war that way the war will end more
Quickly instead of taking a b when we on there Factory security people came straight up than Mar from the M of p d November 9th 2021 the first time ever the C we see such like during the about 38 there were attacks on the last 7 in y the B family
The B themselves had already been sled to war br especially since the nors have be expelled from State primary school and had to attend that hased Jew CL in B during the PO y’s shop was attacked the do wiow and his play and the walls around the
Court you B was taken into protective C and then by to the B by in December 1938 after he came back was the r Frank where he was at on 29 large4 possibly is a consequence concentration you to in gal custody he was buried in the Jewish s children in
B his wife and the two daughters ra to the GS and died of the Jewish people were born and the in with following di y the National Socialist period you 1880 1930 1895 1928 1890 yeah 19 27 1900 1895 1899 1893 bads 1924 next no better than it’s import s for victims of
Political raal and religious persecution from great certification the above name is a member of grou of persons who were CED by the at the past years please support the owner of this indication to shanon and help this is a paper my mother received what do the papers look like
That people today who have managed to save themselves receive are there any use to those who receive them what use hopefully they get such papers text number 12 we travel back there again I’ve all forgotten the bunker how could I forget the bunker it was a sunlit day and Ana had
Said what are you after there there’s nothing there still I’d sprayed my foot and my daughter had to help me jump over the little ditch that separated the Hill from the road little bushes Nettles and thly Rambles we’d gone the wrong way we went back again this is where it must have been
There was nothing to remember the place as if it was now disowned a couple of meters beyond the place named s we looked through railings downwards this must have been the exit once buried under soil thrown over hard to believe that the locals had been assembled here probably pressed close
Together it was like a dungeon now her K had legalized them had the two of them declared husband and wife and my sister hanora his daughter that has to be the reason why they went into the bunker with everyone else to stay outside would have attracted attention everyone wanted to find safety
From the ones who were coming the American troops were already Audible The Tracks of the tents were churning through the soil she must have got herself and her child up close to the bunker door pushed forward through the others when she heard them getting closer so she told
It she managed to open the bunker door behind her the people were Whispering no no the enem is out there don’t go she took the child 8-year-old Hannah laa firmly by the hand and pulled her outside with her the child was scared of the noise of the approaching
Tents I can’t see what direction they came from just the neat road now a fast well-built Road no signs of broken chag she must have pulled her child more tightly to her said no those aren’t our enemies they’re from where Aunt Elsa went T number 13 vinar the people called the bankard
Where a sign is attached in the name of the successor company car and S telling those without permission that they must keep out seven potach mines in Hessa slave laborers and concentration camp prisoners was how it was says the calmed s media spokesman no mention of the people worked to death
Underground who while they were still alive were brought up briefly once a fortnight into the daylight like dogs and then taken back down they lived below ground and then death marches was how it was how it was says the media spokesman nothing precise is known sadly sadly no signboard no clue no
Memorial an internal study we’re not allowed to see the water the river ver is cingo that was us says the media spokesman the miners National F song thetiger Lead they will sing that on the way down and on the way up at get togethers and their families too a safe
Keeps watch down there she keeps them safe they say sacred mass of mining ships and then GL Al the ster lead refrain look coming up that’s traditional here once Karen used to have that fear that fear of the women for their men if something happens Underground some grow old
Early Manfred refused to go down not for anything in the world he says but the money draws the young men now women too shift bonuses Castle Hamburg the 26th of October 2021 results for the third quarter of 2021 exceptional raw materials price environment favors strong financial results vent Hal Europe’s leading independent
Natural gas and oil Enterprise has published figures for business operations in the third quarter of 2021 isn’t that a bit I mean back then what back then led by a prominent industrialist of the third R well it was the same everywhere when I met Guy Stan I knew
Nothing about the huge and B of this output for the war he’s a professor now was able to save himself as a 16-year-old tries to get his parents out fails he keeps explaining again and again how he actually might have succeeded he’s in Detroit n then he talks about the Richie
Boys he was part of that true I take the DVD back to Germany after watching the film I understood that he had come to Germany as part of the Allied army they spoke German they’d operated behind the lines at D-Day and then afterwards They carried out in interrogations here very close to here
He was stationed in B hafeld so he was among those my mother and sister watched towards straight away within days she would was with them she’d learn English believed in The Liberation here it is on paper professional translator I write a mail to Guy Stan you liberated my mother Hela and my
Sister Hannah La guy replies you made my day text number 16 Aunt Ela who had been removed from her job in the heist offices as unarian under the Civil Service law early on Aunt Ela who I saw on a motorbike always on holiday somewhere with women friends with an
Exceptional reference from the director of The Heist stag she had never stopped trying after she played to secure entry visas for her brother and his family for the United States for Bolivia she paid and paid and set money by Securus Roots gathered information earned little by herself in Exile as a
Secretary knew that her mother her aunt wrote letters to the tracing service would send packets to tanat no answer no wrote to these and to those begged threatened paid in vain and when the child was still no more than three years old when there was still hope yet it was elza who from
Somewhere from Switzerland from England sent her something for her birthday with addess for the girl girl and a toy so that’s the way they walked towards the American towns and said we’re Jews help us the handwritten note has been kept written by the commander marching through there it declares the two to be
Under the protection of the Liberation Army they moved to Philips to under their real name for the first time and in their own flat Paradise began said my sister I’m so much Esther and Johnny for fascinating thought provoking presentation and we have some time for questions um obviously those of you in
The room Short age to raise your hands if you’re watching on Zoom if you could cly type your question into the chat and we will read it out there is a microphone that can work its way around the yes thank you so much um I was going through the zoom oh
Yeah thank you so much for the for the beautiful reading as well I was really interested at the beginning when you talked about resisting I can’t remember if you said the musealization or the museumize I was really curious to hear about the exhibition that you worked on
At the trans Transport Museum in Berlin and how you were thinking about this in in relationship to curation could you repeat the last second were you working as a curator on the exhibition yeah so was as you were working with different curatorial strategies were you thinking about this
Very problem or this tension about the way in which the museum objectified history or historical subjects yeah you heard us leaving the text on the Jewish people in for example and I it’s do you could think differently to this why we including this in the exhibition why mentioning this it’s
About the skitt and to oral I no we go to know to this here this place and of course we need to know what at the time they were what what already was was happening here so I cannot exclude it I will not never exclude this
Now you may think it doesn’t belong to the story I think it belong so I ex justed that this becomes and also videos that when memory went or um other Um other questions like if if I talk about The Liberation yeah um we have the way a way to think like the were ping like describe soldiers of and maybe May no I’m not going for this kind of images we saw for for ages and I insisted to fill a whole dra door
With um Hershey CH in the BR one very dark because this is with the chocolate it with so for me this was totally important and the whole draw fil with this Choate and people who are putting it out or welcome to take it or not whatsoever so we have refill it a bit
With B but also a little bit Act um another question you saw this Al there on the screen who is the paining the the and um this is the very peaceful vage peaceful but at the same time it’s also mentioned it’s an AR so we to a group
Who part in the varation often was neglect of l so looking like this um so in the with with literary lure text I I was able to press um what is is has already taken place in between and after this waves of and and initation and and public disc
Conference and in a way also capturing and the people who were the ones originally but it’s not so press yeah and uh what what already um was was in b my li because of this and not because I just stick close to to the objects of material what the people say Anda
Insisted all the time yeah so um it it when this text I can um also it say um that my work is not to be done F make the broken story complete so I expose the hope the not knowing the the mission and were documents by no one
But I think I did not really understand after for example then one document it isn’t here my mother also it was person from the Jewish organization is coming to her because she was getting bir she put inol that so he was taking n what she was saying and there is one sentence she
Never ever repeated anywhere else it was the sentence also mentioned the again go and then saying uh but often people who who were helpy at get I mean they were blood Med ads they were exped ads so and often I did not have only to pay material I had to pay also in
Mator so and for for ages I overlooked the sentence yeah and then all of a sudden I saw it it again and I said okay I just Dre recently WR the book by Emmanuel B my way from uh the Congo to Europe and he describes his play as the
Someone who was fighting for democracy in the Congo and he was persecuted and H free through the desert and he’s describing what happens when he cross borders and he is accompanied by other women who also are of the flight and his just describing um how he was full of sh
Describing that he saw what the women especially we can PR and we can wait it through and qu about and I said okay this is so currently so important I will put this document my mother’s document in the draw yeah um because there is this angle to situation
Of women on flight today at the border and Border environment so and so in a different aspect I try to um to to make this possible to think of today if the opening in C for example where the exhibition was open at the Smart Museum uh I reached out to or he said
Something like sit in society City and uh our can is very much suffering from right wing and so I I wanted to just to give those who are closed the great States also through the exhibition and I reached out to them and two women from Afghanistan I think when we saw the
Place in the text where it was written the schools were closed and no one could go SCH anymore and immediately I think today wasan um two women from Afghanistan they had to go up and take the microphone and B for first time and and as B what what
Happened to them after they reach Germany and and how this them it was to to deal with what bureaucracy neglecting the real names of of the children and what so um and um this event also was integrated in the Jewish country and the organizes lat said well
They had never thought of this way to talk about the PA and what what happened the result was the um the woman who was the uh for the the president of the Jewish of community in kids she was there and other Recon were also there so at least these
Two women now got on with the same thing to do all yeah and um so I I reach out to to different as aspect or how did you how do you talk about someone you don’t know so I follow the family narration but they still yeah then I thought okay well here
It was so important what he worked for yeah his work but we didn’t have PHS actually where you were seen working yeah but what we have is UC photos by J R you saw that this Henry sing carrying the the stuff so this was
The kind of work he need to do so you get an idea what he he stay I was like didn’t he was he was not coming a lot never and it and and also those questions this page 20 yet I think we are full of the idea that
There is a group of resist the group yeah and ideology maybe communistic maybe socialistic maybe maybe religious wise Christian so the gr cond do the rism the world is strong it didn’t work there was no PO it wasn’t yeah and and although you can know it f away from time to time again
Thing raising the question what does it mean to take responsibility the personal responsibility his colleagues did not do it they were in must involved in the deportation yeah je money with this and no one of them was ever accused or brought to try no one really no one so and at the very
Very same time this man we do not know anything about him he he wasn’t the feminist says no he was not religious no he rich not he was not into some ideology he just did it we don’t even know whether they liked each other yeah he a
Fiance the fiance knew that he took in the to so the fan did not come with so he took the responsibility and is all the time fing about I said and these are messages in my f of today of today and hopefully I remember yeah come this way down so start with Frank
It was yeah thank you Esther for your really um inspiring talk just like all your writing um it leaves one with the with the right questions I think um I have a question about the the practicality of the exhibition as I haven’t seen it yet how did you um
Bridge visually that you actually had two narratives about britz Skittle if I understood correctly the one that that was in your mind that you were exploring and the one that the family had you touched on that a little bit now but how did you translate that into the exhibition space and um
Second question would be how did you work with the footage because you mentioned that um Gad Chik was was filming um did you turn this into um footage for the exhibition or did you turn it into a documentary what what happened with that yeah audio visual
Material yeah um and I on directly as so um the exhibition included 10 pieces of short videos stb so three minutes up to five you could press the button and then decide what do you want to see you want to see how family members and we are
Traveling sh looking for che exactly the address where in up so one thing second there is an interview with my neew a son a son of my eldest sister and he is talking about what he fell when he first saw the fil and open it up and how how they got
To him also an interesting question um then there is the interview only on N the daughter that’s K’s daughter and um let’s and the daughter and I were talking about what had she know and what does she not know and what is her approach forward and another one is this spinder
Is completed from my daughter so this the third imation she visited all white herself all places of refugee she knew us in berin and photographed them and made their own work Al fly out work St only from seeing seeing today yeah well how it looks today you go there you stay
In front of something you know something in the past was there but it’s not it’s not spoken about yeah you just see it and uh and there very very important found Fage then being in his wanted to do and about and this was full sou and six and
She did a lot of interviews with her but she never released the movie Sor just didn’t work and G ship was able to find her was able to convince her to contribute these pieces and astonishingly for all of us my sister extensive talks about Mr ker she never did this
Uh in front of us yeah but she did it so this is part now of the exhibition toward of course Very to me also very um important because um for me it’s a document proving the um Integrity of Mage I wouldn’t have done the whole thing if I would have had any doubt
About and yeah and the way she’s talking the way she’s mentioning him for clear this was all very very peaceful and very careful and it’s not wor about he off this some of this Sunday so she could meet other children she enjoyed it sure but so I mean did I miss question
The lady behind no I would best what you did sorry okay um as one who who actually uh has seen your exhibition I can say that you can also read it besides this personal story that you’re talking about mainly about the role of the German Railway
During um the second world War uh and about um its role in in this death Machinery of the Holocaust um and you said that um your co-curator actually was a historian from do Shaban and my question is um uh was there any point during your curatorial process where you
Had the impression um that deutan wants you to display certain things or not to display certain things in a way um and I will avoid the word of whitewashing because the documents you can see are are terrible if they are invoicing for example the ministry for the transport
Of 7,000 Jews from from Frankfurt to to to Minsk or whatever but um was there was there do you have the impression that they um in a way um want to control it at the end because they partly financed it as far as I know no well
Yeah yes and no I mean they there was a a vivid interest to to show they they would not Avo to with pass but how hand do this how this for example that that that no one was ever accused or letting me to the suggestion to say okay what person I me
Didn’t W with accuse let’s show uh what was turned into the trial and it’s it’s it’s s much this is for example the trial against the perpetrators of the so called National Socialist underground cries Rec in 2013 the it’s like MTH and but this guy was
Like this so I said okay let’s show this and the end he got away with it um pretending house with and then the 25 years the longer and this would be only one ever brought up in this position and this means of course that after 45 maybe the rail workers could go back
To their jobs and is also needs to corporate identity work that of course one would know from the other that he Ed running this and this F so no one BR besided one we had Arguments for what for example this thing with us to why why do I want to incl the head
Angs I couldn’t discuss it for me was C I would not be able not men or there is another draw I’ve totally um put together the stories of ComEd of those who did not live so the whole draw is completed with the and difference a lot of difference
About this why do you know it then true they made it and the great parents also made it they not the story yeah this the story is at the same time these others did not and then I’m not going to tell just this this that heartbreaking story on so
Stand out they belong they belong in the story of the all and they still belong to my story it’s my doctor story they AR get away it’s just they don’t away they could but we had that huge differences about that and and how to um how to
Describe the story of I was not interested in when was the person born where did she go to which job when did he get married and how many show he have and whatever it is no way I’m um I thought this for me it’s totally boring in was very good guy so
Um and of course I insisted how important these BS of literature are um because I think otherwise you you cannot even um have enough to judge yeah for the question of Integrity it is there of course of course I want no of course I W be yeah we had a lot of differences
About this which on one and belong to the fact that as historian was used to to see other other objects more important and uh what I also did not that rual was that there was the Deep wish to to ENT three other of other why didn’t do that yeah
They were they all all and and there was way were well I mean what is the the Mage there were a lot of all it I mean it’s so true so this is there were surely T tension great Pion and and also this problem German company um in a
Way yeah of course can can they Lo it it’s um it’s it’s it’s a bman saying we come to T with the but on the other hand they now employ more than 30,000 people and even if you only said of the um as effect and efforts within uh the employment uh grow it’s
It’s Sous yeah they all got to read it they all got to um the the education that people were in education with ro there they could go there and um and it was just to January the end of January the ex in mil it the um museum
Thean and at the weekend there were ,000 lot and it was not too fers to have it often in only the interior icing B raway something but on the other hand there were people coming which did not come because of choing yeah they they because this fascination of um yeah machine B Machine
Yeah and and yeah it’s um and Johnny was also there bu me and it function like this you had you got this 80 folder yeah and um the text where um it related to sub objects so if you go out of drawer it might say on the
Side number 40 then you go and look where is number 40 which dra and then you will um organize your own little work so like this and by the way I like to make sure that this translation was done by pman once once we have C or to be and
Um yeah and sure that is I would um have given even L than for more attention to very um yeah you have to work it out in such C for an artist for an artist it’s not very funny to work but s sh were they were just not
Used to to s in in this kind decisions of decision making and also practical I mean would set up the beds where the solution would be shown already two years in advance at least but they were huge f she have a lot of money oh should they put it as
For they find the place but it’s maybe not the best they yeah but yeah and I also be around back to your question that The cture Spook let and then only about my son only abouts they they are in there this they wanted to do they wanted to leave out the
Lure out the whole Sur and from frot speaks for lot expion sorry but the CEO of was there and he gave a speech at the opening and it’s almost a year ago so I didn’t quite remember but he’s I think he mentions like when he was talking about p k he
Mentioned or something like that and the saying saying s very about had the got that no for them it was a for me it was totally about just c not theories about his character all research which I could which we could found this is present there’s no more and my daughter lady was
The one who took all the shine which 45 and they and and no his so anti as to compare with other railro workers it’s wonderful yeah and what’s maybe I like to add um also at the opening of of the exhibition there was not this idea that some from to was the
Flying for German Parliament you know where work company but they thought the next time the exhibtion was inham and in and all then yeah the last station in leading by Sy Sy all also D which I yeah but they did this way yeah do we know that I mean prepare the FL of
Those when North for and then go up we set back been you know especially ritualized set get sign two of them are and um if if someone likes to get hold or FR of the images they can just get that here I I prepared this for an event
Where we could not even F this because there was no sleep and bring it over like half so I was just see are there any questions I will Zoom chat okay well not we are justed time so thank you again yes for her wonderful performance this evening thank you for
Your questions we have some drinks and refreshments afterwards if you go down the corridor and turn right through the Long Hall is just at the back hope to join you there shortly but please join me again in thank B