Context
Central and Eastern Europe is heavily covered with the forgotten graves of Jews murdered during WWII in what came to be known as the Holocaust by bullets. Its victims rest in unmarked graves in forests, roadside ditches and fields. While the exact locations of these nameless graves and the number of victims resting in them often remains unknown to researchers and their descendants, some are still preserved in the memory of the local communities. Since 2014, the Zapomniane Foundation has been searching for, locating, studying and commemorating the forgotten graves of these Holocaust victims in Poland. The Foundation collects and receives information from individuals and communities about locations as well as the history of such places.
In 2015, the Zapomniane Foundation carried out non-invasive field research on an unmarked Jewish burial site located in a forest near the village of Pikule (the Lublin region in Eastern Poland), where eleven local Jews were hiding in a dug-out and were subsequently killed by unknown perpetrators in 1942. The supposed site of the burial was indicated to the Foundation by one of the locals who had learned this story from a now-deceased colleague from the neighbouring village.
Challenges
- HOW to establish the precise burial location with the best non- invasive methods possible?
- HOW to carry out a commemorative practice in a forest, respecting both the memory of the victims and the surrounding nature?
- HOW to embed local remembrance practice of the Holocaust in the local context?
Highlights
- • Bringing the local, vernacular memory to the forefront & integrating it into local memory culture – from individual testimonials to remembrance practices with the whole community
- Carrying out a participatory process leading up to a commemoration, engaging local community, local authorities and NGOs, schools, cultural centre, forestry officials, and other parties
- Setting up distinctive, harmonious with nature (forest setting), spaces of remembrance of Holocaust victims with the use of original landscape architecture techniques and green commemoration approaches
Description
In 2015, Zapomniane Foundation recorded the in-person testimonial of the resident and indicated the supposed location of the mass grave following his exact indications. The Foundation also established first contacts with the local authorities, local organisations, as well as the local Forest Inspectorate in charge of the land and carried out non-invasive research.
In 2017, the site was marked with a symbolic wooden matzevah as part of the “30 matzevahs in 30 days” project, supported by the Matzevah Foundation from the US.
Five years later, in October 2022, Zapomniane Foundation carried out research of the hiding place and the place where the victims were buried using a georadar and state- of-the-art technology (find more information about the methodology here). This non-invasive method allowed the team to pinpoint the exact location.
In 2020 the Zapomniane Foundation established a collaboration with local activists and local schools in Janów Lubelski. It was followed by a creative workshop combining technology and traditional crafts engaging local youth. During the workshop the participants co-created a wooden matzevah for a local Jewish cemetery that was uncommemorated and unmarked.
In preparation for the permanent commemoration of the site, a landscape architect (Natalia Budnik) was involved in order to design, with the Foundation’s team and an invited expert, a sustainable memorial for the site. It was decided
that the location of the dugout and burial site will be marked with plants which will both visually demarcate it as well as secure and protect it from natural factors such as animals, erosion and others.. It was important for the team that the plans chosen for the memorial would correspond to the local ecosystem and characteristics of this particular forest. The Foundation closely cooperated with the Forestry Inspectorate and local authorities to obtain the permit for a commemorative monument, while also consulting botanists and biologists.
In November 2022, a memorial ceremony took place in Pikule. A stone matzevah and an information board were placed alongside the wooden one. On the morning of November 4, 2022, the monument/tombstone in the village of Pikule was unveiled, together with the local community and local representatives: a regional museum, the Janów Lubelski Forest Inspectorate, as well as the local authorities of Janów Lubelski and neighbouring communes, representatives of the clergy, including a Rabbi and a Bishop, the youth from local high school, and representatives of Jewish organisations.
The official ceremony was accompanied by cultural events: a photo workshops for local high school students, a film screening at a local cultural centre as well as meetings with residents organised by a local NGO, Janowskie Stowarzyszenie Ławeczka Dialogu, working on remembrance and multicultural history of the region. More than 100 people took part in commemoration: more details about the programme can be found here.
Solutions
- Developing an idea of a living green monument that both visually marks the burial site as well as protects human remains from disturbance (by humans, animals, natural elements) through landscaping and the use of specific types of plants.
- Conducting gradual process of commemoration – starting from research followed by marking with a temporary wooden marker and eventually with participatory commemorative ceremony and the unveiling of the green memorial.
- Establishing a long-term collaborative process involving multiple stakeholders leading up to a commemoration, including public authorities.
Lessons Learnt
• Involving local population and local authorities from the very start in co-creating the commemoration and an educational program
• Looking for non-invasive ways to honor the memory of the victims and surrounding nature
• Building a comprehensive programme of commemoration, with a dedicated ceremony and specific accompanying events for various audiences (film screening, an event for high school students)
Funding
The first symbolic commemoration (a wooden matzevah) was carried out with the support of the Matzevah Foundation. The Zapomniane Foundation benefitted from the financial support of the Polish Ministry of Culture and
National Heritage and International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance. The commemoration in 2022 was carried out as part of the “Negotiating Difficult Pasts” project, financed by the The Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programme of the European Union. The project partners, FestivALT from Kraków & Urban Memory Foundation from Wrocław, were also closely involved.
Further information
- The Zapomniane Foundation is still proactively looking for information on the identity of the victims and the location of other Jewish burials in Pikule. For further information, consult the Foundation’s website.