Difficult Heritage & New Ways of Working with Public Memory

As an independent expert, Maciej deals with, among others: topics of creative sectors, cultural heritage and the role of culture in local development. Currently, he runs his own business: he advises the European Cultural Foundation on European policies, and co-leads the campaign for the role of culture in EU policies, Cultural Deal for Europe. He is also an expert assessing applications in EU programs, and conducts workshops and conferences. In the years 2015-2021, he worked as an official at the European Commission in Brussels in the cultural policy department, and previously at the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the British Council offices in Warsaw and Paris. He is a translator and political scientist by education, a graduate of the University of Warsaw and the College of Europe. Collaborates with the Urban Memory Foundation and NeDiPa project.

Dr. Falek works since 2020 as Policy Officer at the European Commission, DG Justice, in the Office of the European Coordinator for combating antisemitism and fostering Jewish life, Ms. Katharina von Schnurbein. She is in charge of files related to education, research, Holocaust remembrance, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism, fostering Jewish life and leading the global fight against antisemitism. Before joining the Commission, she worked as Curator and then Director of the Jewish Museum of Belgium. As research project manager at the Belgian State Archives, she co-published an archival source guide on Jewish history 19-20th centuries. She has a Master degree in Contemporary History (Université Libre de Bruxelles, 2003), a Master of Studies in Jewish Studies (Oxford University, 2004), a Master of Arts in European Studies (College of Europe, Natolin, 2005), and a PhD in History and Civilization from the European University Institute (Florence, 2011).

Anna Striethorst is Senior Sector Officer for Civil Society at the EEA and Norway Grants. She has substantial work experience in government relations, policy analysis and programme management, gained at the Ariadne funders network for human rights and social justice, the Roma programme of the Open Society Foundations and a German political foundation. Volunteering for political and social causes since young age, she currently serves as deputy chairperson of the Antigypsyism Reporting and Information Centre (MIA) in Germany. She has an advanced degree in Political Sciences, European and International Law and Slavonic Studies from the universities of Marburg, Bonn, London (UCL) and Wroclaw, as well as an academic certificate in negotiation from Harvard University.

PhD, anthropologist, researcher, co-author of the Museum Laboratory and "Museums for the Climate" initiative. Director of the Digital Center in Warsaw. She is interested in the social role of cultural institutions and their relations with recipients, and specializes in the analysis and implementation of participatory strategies, audience research and opening access to heritage resources. In his academic work, he studies cultures of memory and the role of institutions in the process of institutionalization of discourses about the past. Vice-president of the Zapomniane Foundation, which deals with finding and locating forgotten, uncommemorated graves of Holocaust victims.

Activist, curator and cultural animator. For years, he has been collaborating with Jewish organizations in Poland and abroad to create innovative and original community, educational and artistic projects. Co-founder of numerous Polish-Jewish cultural initiatives. Professionally, she is the coordinator for Central and Eastern Europe of the Limmud organization, dealing with grassroots Jewish education and associating 92 organizations around the world. Since 2017, co-founder and co-curator of FestivALT.

Co-founder and director of the Urban Memory Foundation (UMF) in Wrocław, which deals with the heritage and memory of the pre-war Jewish community of the city - then German Breslau. Manager, fundraiser, cultural activist and Jewish studies researcher. In 2020-2021, she worked as European Partnership Manager for the Israeli-Palestinian educational organization The Middle East Entrepreneurs of Tomorrow - MEET. She has a ten-year professional career in Brussels, where she specialized in managing corporate and public events and communication strategies involving European Union programs and institutions. Master's degree in Political Science from the University of Wrocław and Jewish Civilizations from the Hochschule für Jüdische Studien Heidelberg. Graduate of a one-year program at the European Institute of Jewish Studies in Sweden - Paideia. Recipient of the Nahum Goldman Fellowship and the Szloma-Albam Stiftung. Co-author of the publication "Breslau / Wrocław 1933–1949. Studien zur Topographie der Shoah” which is the result of a research project conducted by the Dresden University of Technology.

Dr. Falek works since 2020 as Policy Officer at the European Commission, DG Justice, in the Office of the European Coordinator for combating antisemitism and fostering Jewish life, Ms. Katharina von Schnurbein. She is in charge of files related to education, research, Holocaust remembrance, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism, fostering Jewish life and leading the global fight against antisemitism. Before joining the Commission, she worked as Curator and then Director of the Jewish Museum of Belgium. As research project manager at the Belgian State Archives, she co-published an archival source guide on Jewish history 19-20th centuries. She has a Master degree in Contemporary History (Université Libre de Bruxelles, 2003), a Master of Studies in Jewish Studies (Oxford University, 2004), a Master of Arts in European Studies (College of Europe, Natolin, 2005), and a PhD in History and Civilization from the European University Institute (Florence, 2011).

Witold Wrzosiński was born in 1980 in Warsaw and holds an MA in Hebrew Studies from the Warsaw University. Since 2020, he has been the director of the Okopowa Jewish Cemetery in Warsaw. In 2022 he was elected Member of the Board of the Warsaw Jewish Community and in 2023 he became Member of the Board of the Association of Polish Jewish Communities. At the same time, Witold runs the Foundation for Documentation of Jewish Cemeteries, which has indexed and published more than 115,000 inscriptions from over 110 cemeteries in Poland, complete with transcriptions, photographs and locations. He has created the Hebrew transcription system for the Core Exhibit of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews POLIN and worked on several other exhibits. Other than that, over the years he has organized several research projects and heritage tours for hundreds of descendants of Polish Jews from all over the world.

Co-founder and director of the Urban Memory Foundation (UMF) in Wrocław, which deals with the heritage and memory of the pre-war Jewish community of the city - then German Breslau. Manager, fundraiser, cultural activist and Jewish studies researcher. In 2020-2021, she worked as European Partnership Manager for the Israeli-Palestinian educational organization The Middle East Entrepreneurs of Tomorrow - MEET. She has a ten-year professional career in Brussels, where she specialized in managing corporate and public events and communication strategies involving European Union programs and institutions. Master's degree in Political Science from the University of Wrocław and Jewish Civilizations from the Hochschule für Jüdische Studien Heidelberg. Graduate of a one-year program at the European Institute of Jewish Studies in Sweden - Paideia. Recipient of the Nahum Goldman Fellowship and the Szloma-Albam Stiftung. Co-author of the publication "Breslau / Wrocław 1933–1949. Studien zur Topographie der Shoah” which is the result of a research project conducted by the Dresden University of Technology.

PhD, anthropologist, researcher, co-author of the Museum Laboratory and "Museums for the Climate" initiative. Director of the Digital Center in Warsaw. She is interested in the social role of cultural institutions and their relations with recipients, and specializes in the analysis and implementation of participatory strategies, audience research and opening access to heritage resources. In his academic work, he studies cultures of memory and the role of institutions in the process of institutionalization of discourses about the past. Vice-president of the Zapomniane Foundation, which deals with finding and locating forgotten, uncommemorated graves of Holocaust victims.

Anna Schapiro is a visual artist and writer based in Berlin. Her works have been shown, among others, in Basel, Berlin, Dresden, Hamburg, Heidelberg, Łódź, Lublin, New York, Porto, Stuttgart and Wrocław.
To learn more, visit: www.annaschapiro.com

Anna Striethorst is Senior Sector Officer for Civil Society at the EEA and Norway Grants. She has substantial work experience in government relations, policy analysis and programme management, gained at the Ariadne funders network for human rights and social justice, the Roma programme of the Open Society Foundations and a German political foundation. Volunteering for political and social causes since young age, she currently serves as deputy chairperson of the Antigypsyism Reporting and Information Centre (MIA) in Germany. She has an advanced degree in Political Sciences, European and International Law and Slavonic Studies from the universities of Marburg, Bonn, London (UCL) and Wroclaw, as well as an academic certificate in negotiation from Harvard University.

Activist, curator and cultural animator. For years, he has been collaborating with Jewish organizations in Poland and abroad to create innovative and original community, educational and artistic projects. Co-founder of numerous Polish-Jewish cultural initiatives. Professionally, she is the coordinator for Central and Eastern Europe of the Limmud organization, dealing with grassroots Jewish education and associating 92 organizations around the world. Since 2017, co-founder and co-curator of FestivALT.