Observing Memories Issue 7 - December 2023 | Page 99

Havel addressed the Czech population several times , explaining the suffering of the Jewish people during the Holocaust and he visited Terezín with Israeli Presidents Herzog and Weizmann in 1991 and in 1996 .
After a long wait , the “ Velvet Revolution ” set the stage for the implementation of the plans that had emerged during the reform movement in the 1960s . As early as 1990 , the building which housed one of the Homes for Youth during the Ghetto period was vacated and preparations began to build a new museum in terms of technical and material provision and content . It was eventually opened to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of the deportation of Jews from Czech soil and the establishment of the Terezín Ghetto . The Terezín Initiative , which was then an organisation associating former Terezín Ghetto inmates , systematically supported the Memorial ’ s new management in commemorating the victims of the Terezín Ghetto , thereby redressing all the wrongs committed by the previous regime . First and foremost , it was crucial to convince the country ’ s new political leaders of the need to create a new system to remember the victims of the Holocaust .
In the early 1990s , the Terezín Memorial became an institution directly administered by the Ministry of Culture . This was conducive to an overall upgrade of the quality of its work , helping Memorial to surmount the burdens of the past fairly quickly and to win recognition and a reputation at home and abroad .
Emphasis was mainly put on the development of research on the Holocaust . Contacts were set up again with institutions and scholars abroad . A number of international scholarly conferences about the history of the Nazi occupation were held in Terezín in the 1990s . Almost all these conferences were dedicated to the history of the Holocaust . However , there was also other work connected with the previous work of the Terezín Memorial . After building the Ghetto Museum and starting the scholarly research on the history of the Holocaust , the next goal was to prepare a new exhibition tracing the history of the Gestapo Police Prison in the Small Fortress Museum in Terezín . A new display , set up shortly thereafter in the Crematorium in the Jewish Cemetery , proved to be highly needed as well . The existing one , which dated back to the 1980s and was noted for its modest extent , gave rise to the newly emerging permanent exhibition . Another permanent exhibition was organised relatively soon afterwards : the Art Exhibition of the Terezín Memorial and the Litoměřice Concentration Camp 1944-1945 . Another important task was to begin research on the history of the detention camp for the Germans , which was housed in the Small Fortress from 1945 to 1948 , which was followed by the creation of a new exhibition on this controversial issue in recent Czech history , which had previously been a strict taboo .
During the 1990s , all previous exhibitions from the time before the “ Velvet Revolution ” that had been inadequate and inaccurately presented the history of the repressive facilities in Terezín and Litoměřice were replaced by new ones . Seen in this light , the newly created exhibitions in the former Magdeburg Barracks were required to upgrade the quality of their museum presentations significantly , while new displays were expected primarily to present the culture and arts in the Terezín Ghetto . Symbolically , the new premises opened in the fiftieth anniversary of the Terezín Memorial , while a replica of a typical Terezín Ghetto dormitory and the exhibition entitled “ Music in the Terezín Ghetto ” were unveiled . The permanent exhibition “ Art in the Terezín Ghetto ” was opened in 1998 , another on “ Literary Work in the Terezín Ghetto ” was opened in 1999 and a third , “ Theatre in the Terezín Ghetto ”, was opened to the public in 2000 .
On 26 November 2001 , the new permanent exhibition of the Ghetto Museum called “ Terezín in the ‘ Final Solution of the Jewish Question ’ 1941-1945 ” was opened .
This involved completely new educational efforts . Brand-new educational programmes were devised for young people of different age groups , which
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