INSTAGRAM DOCUMENTARY
"HIS NAME IS MY NAME"
In the animated Instagram documentary series His Name Is My Name, Jongsma and her partner Kel O’Neill unearth a history that is at once unique and universal. Equal parts detective thriller and personal essay, His Name Is My Name explores how the crimes of WWII-era perpetrators still reverberate through today’s society, shaking the foundations of our homes and our families.
“This is the story of a man named Gerrit Jongsma. It’s about his crimes, and about how those crimes have been hidden—by his family, by government policy, and by the sweep of time. He was a member of the Dutch SS and a Jew hunter whose signature damned at least one family to their deaths. And he was also my great-grandfather. But until recently, I’d never even heard his name.” Writes Eline Jongsma.
Emmy-nominated filmmakers present the groundbreaking documentary in 10 animated chapters and an AR experienceonly on Instagram. Follow now, www.instagram.com/hisnamemyname
The film is part of „House of darkness” project, a small-scale cooperation in which three WW2 memorial centres, together with a non-profit media organisation, invite a young audience to participate in exploring perpetrator spaces and the question of how to incorporate a legacy of brutality and ignorance in the larger narrative of European cultural heritage.
The project is the result of a joint initiative by the former German Nazi camps and now memorial centres Falstadsenteret (Norway), Herinneringscentrum Kamp Westerbork (Netherlands) and Gedenkstätte Bergen-Belsen (Germany). The project runs to December 2023, and is co-funded by Creative Europe.
Over the past few years, the three institutions have all met with challenges in trying to incorporate ‘perpetrator spaces’ – former camp headquarters and commander houses – in their teaching and curatorial practices. The project is motivated by these challenges.
It is also motivated by an accompanying conviction that today, over 75 years after WW2 and in a time where growing nationalism and violent extremism threatens European integration, it is crucial not to keep perpetrator history and memory in the dark, risking populist voices claiming their ownership to it.
Dutch filmmaker Eline Jongsma grew up unaware that her great-grandfather was a Nazi-aligned mayor famous for his penchant for violence. Known as "Gekke Gerrit" ("Mad Gerrit), he was wiped from the family history after the war. But secrets can’t stay hidden forever.
EHRI