The Ghetto Fighters’ House invites you to a special Talking Memory Program marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz:
The Legacy of Women’s Resistance in Auschwitz
Sunday, April 6th
Opening Remarks
Rochelle Saidel
Founding Director of Remember the Women Institute
Speakers:
Dr. Sarah Cushman
Director of the Holocaust Educational Foundation of Northwestern University
Women Prisoners in Auschwitz/Birkenau
Noa Aharoni
Filmmaker, Director of the documentary film Sabotage
Documenting the Female Perspective on the Holocaust
Ariela Heilman
Daughter of Holocaust Survivor Anna Wajcblum Heilman
Anna Wajcblum: The Pre- and Post-War Years
Yasmine Ron
Archivist at the Ghetto Fighters’ House
Ella Liebermann – Shiber: On The Edge of the Abyss – Art as Testimony
This year marks the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau. In this program, we will focus on the experience of women in one of the most infamous camps in the Nazi regime and in the public memory.
Our first speaker will be Dr. Sarah Cushman. In her presentation, Cushman describes the mortal environment of the Birkenau camp and women prisoners’ attempts to navigate them. In general, women prisoners did not engage directly in armed resistance. What made escape and resistance so difficult? And how did women respond to the deadly conditions? This will be the focus of Cushman’s lecture.
The second speaker is award-winning filmmaker, Noa Aharoni, director of the documentary Sabotage that tells the story of the women’s underground operation in Auschwitz-Birkenau, which ended tragically in the public hanging of four young women. Her film is about feminine heroism, sacrifice, and hope, and Aharoni will share her journey in writing and directing the documentary.
Ariela Heilman, the daughter of Auschwitz saboteur and resistance hero, Anna Heilman (Wajcblum), will share the background story of her mother and aunt, Estusia Wajcblum, one of the four female Jewish prisoners who were hanged in public, accused of sabotaging the Nazi war machine.
Our final speaker will be Jasmin Ron. In her lecture, she will review the life and work of Ella Liebermann-Shiber, a German-Jewish painter and Holocaust survivor. Liebermann-Shiber survived the Bedzin Ghetto and the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, and her paintings serve as a documentation of her experiences. We will examine how Liebermann-Shiber’s art documents key moments in the Holocaust period and discuss the role of art as a tool for historical documentation.
This program is in participation with Remember the Women Institute, Rabin Chair Forum at George Washington University, Wagner College Holocaust Center, and the Johannesburg Holocaust & Genocide Center.