News
Museum and Yad Vashem Sign Agreement on New Exhibition
Yad Vashem in Jerusalem will prepare an entirely new exhibition devoted to the destruction of the Jews, to be installed in block 27 at the Auschwitz I site. Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum Director Dr. Piotr M.A. Cywiński and Yad Vashem Director Avner Shalev signed an agreement in Oświęcim to replace the existing exhibition, titled “The Martyrdom and Struggle of the Jews in Europe in the Years 1933-1945.”
“Block 27 contains an exhibition that opened over thirty years ago. Today, its form is simply obsolete,” said Cywiński. “I am glad that it is going to be completely replaced, and that this will happen more or less at the same time as the replacement of the main exhibition at the Museum.”
Cywiński also draws satisfaction from the fact that the replacement of the exhibition will be done under the aegis of Yad Vashem. “The signing of this agreement, with the approval of the International Auschwitz Council, can be treated as the capstone of our many years of increasingly close cooperation with Yad Vashem, mostly centering around education. In its very essence, the exhibition is educational,” he noted.
Yad Vashem Director Avner Shalev sees the agreement as a milestone in the complete replacement of the exhibition devoted to the Jews. “This agreement is proof of the fruitful cooperation and understanding between our institutions. Yad Vashem will work in parallel with the project already underway for changing the main exhibition at the Auschwitz Memorial, and I hope that the two undertakings will be complementary,” said Shavner.
The current exhibition devoted to the Jews at the Auschwitz Museum was opened in 1978, on the thirty-fifth anniversary of the start of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. In 2006, the International Auschwitz Council passed a motion approving the role of Yad Vashem in updating the exhibition. The Israeli Knesset also passed a special resolution on the matter. A letter of intention was signed in Jerusalem on January 25 of this year, as a result of which the agreement between the Auschwitz Museum and Yad Vashem was concluded.
