An online discussion featuring a first-generation Holocaust survivor, and a moving concert highlighting music composed by a prisoner-of-war held captive in a horrific German camp during World War II are among the final accompanying events to be held as part of “Americans and the Holocaust,” a traveling exhibition on display through March 9 at the James & Abigail Campbell Library at the University of Hawaiʻi–West Oʻahu.
The Campbell Library was one of 50 U.S. libraries selected to host the exhibit, which addresses important themes in American history, including Americans’ responses to refugees, war and genocide in the 1930s and 1940s.
““he Holocaust exhibit and programs challenge us to reflect upon the Jewish experience of survival, the Jewish quest for identity, and the Jewish response as our own,” said Carina Chernisky, public services librarian and co-project lead for the exhibit. “We encourage everyone to make it out before it closes on March 9.”
Upcoming programs related to the exhibit are, “Witness to Horror!: A Holocaust Conversation with Seymour Kazimirski” on February 24, “Roma and Sinti Resistance in Zigeunerlager” on March 2, and, the culminating event, “Quatuor pour la fin du temps: A Concert Experience at UH West Oʻahu” on March 5.
For more information or questions about any of the following events, email uhwolib@hawaii.edu.
“Witness to Horror!: A Holocaust Conversation with Seymour Kazimirski”
Thursday, February. 24, 1–2:30 p.m. via Zoom. Register online.
Seymour Kazimirski, a first-generation Holocaust survivor and Holocaust lecturer, will address the lessons of the Holocaust. Kazimirski will discuss America’s role in the Holocaust, revisionist interpretations and Holocaust denial. He will present actual photos and footage of Ann Kazimirski, his mother, amidst her attempt to live through the Holocaust.
“The most important part of this presentation is for people to be aware of how politics and the Holocaust got involved together,” Kazimirski said. “What happened in America during the Holocaust is critical so that we don’t repeat something like that in our future.”
This will be an interactive Zoom presentation open to the public, and guests will be encouraged to submit questions for discussion. Discussion is encouraged to discredit myths, misconceptions and fallacies associated with the Holocaust.
“Roma and Sinti Resistance in Zigeunerlager”
Wednesday, March 2, 7–8 p.m via Zoom. Register online.
Justyna Matkowska, a Fred and Maria Deviniki Memorial Fellow, will present and discuss Roma and Sinti acts of resistance in Zigeunerlager (Romani family camp) in KL Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp during WWII.
Matkowska was awarded a 2021–22 Fred and Maria Devinki Memorial Fellowship for her research project, “Roma and Sinti Resistance in Auschwitz-Birkenau.” Her project aims to establish evidence of the Roma and Sinti resistance actions in the camp, as well as present the fate of those Romani prisoners who resisted against Nazi oppression.
“Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet for the end of time): A Concert Experience at UH West Oʻahu”
Saturday, March 5, 5–6:30 p.m. at UH West Oʻahu‘s James & Abigail Campbell Library. Event details and registration.
This free performance, by professional musicians from Chamber Music Hawaiʻi, will feature French composer Olivier Messiaen’s Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet for the end of time).
Concert goers will be able to experience the power and indomitability of the human spirit through music that Messiaen composed and performed in the horrific conditions of a German camp, where the French Army soldier was a prisoner-of-war during WWII.
The work that Messiaen composed while imprisoned by the Germans will give guests great insight into his frame of mind at the time, and how he used his passion for music to maintain hope despite the current conditions in the world.
Concert goers will be welcome to tour the “Americans and the Holocaust” exhibition, which will be open from 10 a.m.–7:30 p.m. that day, March 5. Reservations must be made for visitors between 10 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. After 4:30 p.m., walk-ins will be accepted.
“Americans and the Holocaust: A Traveling Exhibition for Libraries” is made possible by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and the American Library Association.
Read more in Ka Puna O Kaloʻi.
—By Zenaida Serrano Arvman
