 We welcome you to the events, the second cluster of events which are taking place in the frame of Transit Days 2012, a series of events dedicated to the celebration of the 25th anniversary of Transit House Inclusion. Tonight we will start this night with a discussion, a presentation of a research made by, though it's a walking progress, I guess it's not good, by Mihai Lukacs, who is a director, theater maker and researcher, and he will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene, the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, a little bit before and after the clockhouse. Today's discussion and presentation is one of Mihai Lukacs, who is a theater director, theater maker and researcher, and he will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, and he will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, and he will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, and he will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, a little bit before and after the clockhouse. The other person who will present his research on the Yiddish theater scene is Mihai Lukacs, who is a professor, and he doesn't have to present his research on the Yiddish theater scene, but maybe he will help us in the context of the Yiddish theater scene in Romania, or our other distinguished guest is Tiboli Saposlopan, a university professor of history who is probably the most qualified person to offer us a kind of more broad general context about the particular problem Mihai will be presenting. So this is an event in the frame of 2015, and after the presentation of the Yiddish theater scene, so please stay with us and let's have a good presentation. So this is an event in the frame of 2015, and after the presentation of the discussion, we also have a film screening, the film Freefall, which is a kind of discussion about the Yiddish theater scene and how to use it as an example, what are the questions of the Yiddish theater scene? We have asked the question of the Yiddish theater scene, Thank you so much for your introduction. As it was mentioned, I am not repeating the meaning in Romanian and Hungarian because I was asked to deliver this just in English. So this will be the language of my house, asked by Mr Lukas to give a certain kind of introduction and to draw up a general context for his presentation about the Holocaust, generally speaking, but especially the Holocaust in Transylvania. Now, of course, I am representing for myself and for my students usually double-closed as a political system, a political system which decided at a certain level to consider some parts, some groups of the members of its own society as enemies of the majority and adopted laws to separate them from the rest of the society to close down different camps and ghettos and then to deport them in Catherine and to surround them to a foreign power, to a foreign country in order to be killed. The question is if such a political system should or could appear again honestly that I never found a negative answer to this question. So we are not very sure that such a system, such a political system, cannot appear again. I am not sure that I myself would not be as impossible to be the victim of such a political system or any of you or any other group of people by which characteristics separated. Now, about the Holocaust in Transylvania, I will treat this aspect in two parts. The northern part of Transylvania and the southern part of Transylvania because it was split in 14 parts and during the Holocaust it was belonging to different countries. Northern Transylvania was a Transylvania, generally speaking, belonging to the Austrian-Hungarian Empire from the end of the 19th century until 1920. I solved the question of emancipation of the Jews very early. Romania didn't solve this question, so it was a big difference between the way Romania handled the Jewish question by denying the emancipation of the Jews for a very long time, until 1923 in fact, when the new constitution, in the new constitution, Romania was forced according to the Treaty of Peace from Saint Germain on Lake in France to, if without any kind of other commentaries, citizenship to the Jewish people in Romania. Now, Hungary solved this question already after the unification was the so-called compromise between Hungary and Austria and the formation of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire. One of the first laws adopted was the Jewish emancipation law. It was a very short law. It says it has only two paragraphs. The first paragraph said that the Jews from now on are equal citizens with the other citizens of the country. The second paragraph was that all kinds of contrary legal provisions are emulated from now on. Hungary was an exception in Europe as well, because after the adopted emancipation law in 1895, the Hungarian Parliament adopted another special law, the so-called reception law. In fact, this law equalized the Israeli religion with the other religions that were spreading the country, the Roman Catholic, the so-called historical religions, the Roman Catholic, the Reformed religion, the Lutheran religion, and the cardedist religion. So, Israeli's religion was equal to this religion's finance, accepted and financed by the state, until they changed their mind after the first war. Now, belonging to Romania, Transylvania, belonging to the many after the World War I, according to the Peace Treaty of Trianon, Transylvania, a big part of the so-called Partium, the Partium of Hungary, which was denominated during the Middle Ages, the Banat, the region of Arad, the Marmarosh, the historical Transylvania were belonging, starting with June 1920 to Romania. There was a growing, after the adoption of the new constitution and the emancipation of the Jews in Romania, already in 1924, Romania changed its mind and started to bring back the citizenship, to redraw the citizenship from some categories of the Jews, and starting with 1925, between 1925 and 1930, there were all kinds of anti-Semitic actions. It was record in the different attacks of the so-called Iron Guard or Legion of Archangel Michael against the Jewish communities, and there was this Professor Mestasek who did the Travelling Program, which was a train coming from Bucharest with students and heading to Boravia, students belonging to the Iron Guard, that destroyed in Boravia cinemas and shops, they came to, we have been to Cluj, and the destruction was huge in all the cities, so Jews were afraid of these actions and were terrified by these actions. In 1934, the first anti-Semitic law in Romania was adopted, numerous clauses, saying that 80% of the employees and 50% of the members of the company had to be Romanian ethnics, and in 1938 another decree was adopted withdrawing the citizenship of several hundreds of thousands of Jews in Romania, and the decree of 1940, or also August 1940, or also the Statute of the Jews actually made the majority of the Jews living in Romania second-ranked citizens of the country. It was a difficult period for both countries because Romania and Hungary had discussions already by the middle of the 19th century about the territory of Transylvania. Hungary was claiming that different parts of this territory, Romania was not willing to offer too much, but something they wanted to offer, so after ceding Transylvania to the Soviet Union and the south end of Romania to Bulgaria, they had a meeting with representatives of the Hungarian government in Tunis, and they had some negotiations, and these negotiations actually failed. And the two governments requested the so-called International Arbitrary Decision, and this Arbitrary Decision was made by Germany and Italy in Vienna in 1940, August 13, and the decision said that the so-called Northern Transylvanian Part was restituted to Hungary, and the Southern Transylvanian Part remained, of course, with Romania. The decision was accepted and implemented by both parties without fags or any other kind of actions. And of course, you see this map with the region that was returned to Hungary and the Southern Transylvanian Part remained to Romania. This is the Northern Transylvanian Part, as it was during the Hungarian Authority. It was divided in counties and it took around 43,000 square kilometers and on which 2.5 million, roughly 2.5 million people lived. Out of this population in Northern Transylvania, more than 150,000 were of Israelite faiths of Jewish by religion according to the census of 1941 and around 14,000 were Christians who left the Israeli faith for different Christian denominations, but were later considered Jews under the Hungarian legislation, the Hungarian racial legislation. So that took the number of people who had to confront and were affected by the Hungarian anti-Jewish legislation was around 164,000, 65,000. Now, you can see here on this map the most important centers were chosen in Northern Transylvania, even in the great number, the greatest was Oratora with around 35,000, 48,000 Jews, then Siget Marlazi, then Tatumari, and then Piusz. So these were the most important centers and the other were Smugler, Deish, Bayamari, and so on and so forth. I usually used to categorize the whole of Northern Transylvania as being produced in four different stages, or four different phases. The first is to categorize expulsions, deportations from different parts of Northern Transylvania. The second is the phase of the Holocaust by Duritz. And the third is the extermination by forced labor, hunger, and disease in this military work in service in the Hungarian military of the Jewish man. And the fourth phase, the phase of the guest chambers, cremation, and the slave labor in different Nazi forced work camps. As you will see, if I mentioned that Romania and Hungary were very different regarding the emancipation of the Jews, now you will see that the two countries acted in a similar way during the first phases of the Holocaust. The first deportations took place from the so-called Sacherland. So, this territory, the territory of these Sacher settlements like Nirkure-Arczu, Georgiania, Borsig, and others, these were the very first acts immediately after the Hungarian army occupied Northern Transylvania after the Second Vienna Award. The military, these actions were carried out by the Hungarian military. The first three phases of the Holocaust in Northern Transylvania were carried out by the Hungarian military. So, these were the very first acts of the Holocaust in Hungary, the Jews from Yerke-Arczu, from Georgian, from Borsig, from the Turkish, from other Jewish settlements on the Sacherland, on this region who were rounded up and were closed in mostly the Paris facilities and then forced to cross the border to Romania. Of course, these people, the Sacherlings were living in Romania. They didn't want to cross the border to Romania because they knew that in Romania already the status of the Jews was inactive and they didn't want to cross the border to Romania. They knew exactly the situation with the anti-Jewish drive from Romania. So, they wanted to come back. The Hungarian military opened the fire against them. Romanian border guards shot them from the other side, so it was a difficult situation. The survivors, this took several weeks of fighting in the Perpetian mountains. After a couple of weeks, they were rounded up again and transported back to the Yerke-Arczu prison. Then they were forced to buy their own train tickets. They were trained and transported to Kursh, as this was an Hungarian settlement in Transcarpatia, in Ukraine, it's called Yashina. It has a Romanian name, nobody knows the name, but it has, believe me, the Romanian name of the city is Krasin. So, according to the prosecutor of the People's Tribunal of Kursh, in 1946, around 2200 casualties, so 200 Jews died in this section from the sacred land. The election was organized and carried out by the military. A certain colonel of the area was the commander of the military administration. The military administration was established in Northern Transcarpatia immediately after the arrival of the Hungarian authorities until from October to September to November to December 1940. But it was actually later, by the end of January, and the Syrian administration took the power from the military. The survivors transported to Yashina during the winter, during December, to cross the Carpathians and to go to Berisha, which was at that time territory of the Soviet Union. Before Germany attacked the Soviet Union in 1941. Now, 21 people disappeared from this one, so the total number of victims was approximately 200, only from the sacred region. Other several thousand Jews were abusively and forcibly respected from different towns and regions of Northern Transylvania to other Transylvanian settlements. This deportation, I mentioned, was organized by the Hungarian military and civil authorities as well who took over the power in January 1941 and continued for two years in 1941 and 1942 and affected actually the entire territory of Northern Transylvania. Even before Hungary centering in the war against the Soviet Union on June 27, 1941, this national central of alien control authority increased dramatically its activity and they were drawing up plans how to resettle the so-called alien Jews in the Soviet territory in Galicia. Now, the pretext for this expulsion was the fact that they want to remove the infiltrated Polish and Russian Jews who infiltrated in Hungary and to expel them to the Soviet territories to go back from where they came. The actions were carried out by Keog, this agency for the control of the aliens in Hungary and the registration and action had the approval of the highest Hungarian officials including the Ministry of Interior, the prime minister and the region authority himself. More than 20,000 Jews were deported from Hungary to without the Athenian and the doctor passed this was the highest point of the Carpathians the other side was already the Soviet Union to the Russia two Colombian and communist photos the Hungarians were deported to Podolia at communist photos the Romanians in the meantime in the same period of time were deported to Podolia to no less photos. Both countries were deported that the aim of both countries was to deport the Jews over the Gnester river in Podolia or in Sicily no matter how or where because the Gnester was a geographic border and the Gnester could be defended in an easier way with two machine guns the number of bridges was extremely few bridges crossing the Gnester river so the bridges could be easily controlled and a few military patrols walking along the river were trying to protect the territories from the Jews not to come back to Hungary or to Romania so they acted in the same way over 16,000 of these Jews deported over 16,000 were killed were shot or machine gun in mass graves near communist Podolski majority of them but also in other spots this action was carried out by Ernest's battalion behind that group at C which was under the command of Ernest's general General Friedrich August Jeker he was hanged in Latvia in 1946 other were mutilated other were shot in the Gnester river we have survivors testimonies saying that the bodies were floating day after day on the Gnester river were killed by other means others ended up in the ghetto orphan ghetto of Sanistar of Haudenka, of Natorno and were killed or starved there from a mission of different people or different other places the most effective Northern Transylvania settlements and Jewish communities were Gretchen nations of Gretchen I mentioned also the Gretchen name it's important for me that all these settlements had a Jewish name had a Yiddish name so it's important to remember from time to time that they had each one of them a Yiddish name as well so I put the first elimination of the settlement because the Yiddish was the official language of the time and if somebody like Mr. Lukasz tries to research this period of time he will have to know the Hungarian official name because the documents in the archives are in this language and with these names but I mentioned also the Romanian and the Yiddish names of these settlements 400 people from Gretchennice or Ukraine this is the first deportation by trade in 1941 in a single day from Gretchennice to Lazeshina through Lazeshina which is now in Ukraine to come in as photos the majority were more murdered there from Siga to Marnazje 450 people were deported in July and in 1941 the majority were murdered there from the same from Satomare 1,000 over 1,000 people and from Hapshaesus to days in Ukraine over 800 people that at that time belong to Marnazje county and so on and so forth you see the settlements I will not enter into more details these deportations in the second phase of the Holocaust in Olegresilena which were ordered by Pugavash carried out by the Hungarian army generated a total of 4 to 5,000 victims unfortunately we don't know the names of these victims and of course this was the first big scale mass murder during the Holocaust in Hungary which can be especially by 5 figures by the 5 the third phase was extermination by false vapor of the man of the Jewish man in the summer of 1942 the Jewish man from Olegresilena for the labor service within the Hungarian army and around 13,000 in Jewish labor service were sent first to Hungarian labor camps then to labor camps in the front line in Ukraine to treatment poor food and the conditions the mass murders and the war injuries number of them died never returned home and by the end of the world others were taken prisoners of the soviet army we have some example as well people from Kluzsch who ended up in not in the Gula but in the Opie system of camps which was the camps of the criminals arrested by the Ministry of Interior at least two servers were in Transylvania with the Jewish labor service and perish during this phase of the Holocaust and there were a lot of massacres like this in Tološić where a few half people sat on fire there were people in the suffering people with fever suffering patients they want to get rid of them and they said the hospital on fire and out of 670 inmates almost 500 was killed during that night if somebody tried to escape they were machine gunned by Hungarian soldiers the first fun phase of the Holocaust in Northern Transylvania started after Germany occupied Hungary Hungary is a very tricky historian a soviet act on March 18th in 1944 he invited the region to pay a visit to him to post Schlaßheim in Sennosia and it's a long story but I'll make it short for you they agreed that Hungary should hand over around 300,000 Hungarian Jews for war purpose production in Germany and Hungary should appoint pro-Nazi who will be a former ambassador to Berlin and the government should be a pro-Nazi oriented and they appointed two Secretary of State in the Eastern Interior two they are called in history and last of all they were the two responsible for the deportation of the Jews of Hungary and this agreement between Eastern and 40 a very important word was played by the dynastic ambitions of 40 Hitler was neutral 40 wanted so desperately to have the approval of Hitler to prepare his second son his first son died in a plane crash in the Soviet Union but the younger the youngest of his two sons 41 to prepare in 4 become dynastic ambitions on March 19 Hungary is occupied by the German forces the occupation took almost 10 days because it was very surprised that occupied Hungary earlier but the superior officers of the army explained that they had to stop in each settlement to listen to the welcome speeches of the local of the local soul this is a courtesy the question they managed to occupy Hungary in 10 days by the end of March the anti-Jewish I began with the internment of several hundreds of wealthiest and influential locality and Jews in Hungarian concentration camps and the colonel Adolf Eichmann with his hermitism a small amount of something called 120 officers together with secretaries and cooks and everything so it was a very small this is important because this is moving that Eichmann and his older brother would not be able without the help of the Hungarian and that they need to actually carry out and prepare material conditions of the Jews in a lifetime registration was adopted and actions were enforced application this is a world plundering of the Jewish property and the characterization of the Jewish and as a number of decrees were adopted in a few weeks there is a highly confidential decrees as well like this the main legal act decree number 6163 from the press the right means the result of the secret confidential decrees not published in the official papers of the time detailing the procedures of the concentration, characterization and deportation of the Jews even Eichmann was surprised by the support he received from the new government and the speed of the deportation Hungarian authorities were very eager to start and very quickly execute the method of deportation program, the library of the Jewish scholars and the deportation Jews organized in a very efficient actually took only six weeks or less three weeks in order to deport almost 140,000 Jews to Austria-Hungary on April 1907 it was a decree a tricky decree of the minister of the public supply it says that by day one that should submit their data their personal data to the local office in order to obtain the new food allocation documents because without these documents they would starve probably so these documents this list of delivered by the Jews because everybody was very eager to be considered this list of food supply this as a basic inventory for the roundup and deposition to choose a couple of things later two city conferences were set up in in the other of two days and they limited to operation and deportation zones the first was the north east of Hungary this was the general domestic number eight in this entered two parties from the Transylvania Marburg and Bung Bung is a county that splits today in three parts one is in Hungary the other part is in Romania and the other part in Ukraine and the second zone the general domestic number nine including the country's visits of the other Plush-Satumarez Szilagian and the general domestic number ten including the second zone deportation which encompassed the several countries Czech, Czech, Tres and Kureš, Kultas and so the general domestic number nine in ten from 1944 it was signed on April 26 by the Minister of Interior of the Hungarian Minister of Interior Jarosz these are the maps with deportation zone eight, nine and ten and the country's own dimension and the main ghettos in all the Transylvania are listed here okay ghettos and I will not inaugurate them because I have to pass the microphone to Mr Lukáč and departure dates of the trains from Northern Transylvania and with with blue the number of Jews deported transported by these trains are listed here the first deportation train started on May 16 from Siege to Marmazje and the bulk of the Jewish population was transported was sent to Auschwitz by June 10 with June 9 from Kureš started the last train and on June 27 it was the last train that started starting from Vorachia but on this train they round up the remaining Jews who were in high or built here so built here from the western part of Bihor country which is today in Hungary the total number of deported persons around 132,000 people of course we don't know we have science and information about other deportation trains so and another transport, a special transport leaving for Switzerland the so-called Kastner transport transported 388 people from Klusch to Udaň Auschwitz the total number of Jews deported was at least 35,000 the maximum number of Transylvanian survivors of the Holocaust was around 35,000 and the minimum number of Transylvanian victims in all of the four phases of the Holocaust was somewhere between 125,000 and 130,000 now the southern Transylvanian situation around 42 individuals were considered Jews under the racial legislation in southern Transylvania they were the men who were involved in labor camps for labor service in in Udaň Filiashka, all of the world's Russian, Europe and so on and so forth very hard conditions of working especially especially Kizaktaur and Kizaktaur Shanovica in the Bernat River where it bled and they deported as well the Romanian from Timisoara from the Bernat River depotations from from Kaslov from Sigišava from Kisaktaur to Gosoryurgot to Mostokovic with some Jews from southern Transylvania who changed their religion to a Christian religion but not to the Romanian Orthodox but to the German the Romanian Orthodox were very mad why they don't pass to the Transnistria others were important because they were social democrats of sympathizing with the communist idea and so on and so forth so there were also plans in southern Transylvania to depot as the southern Transylvanian Jews to occupied Poland to Berserk it was not to Auschwitz but to Berserk the trains were the schedule of the trains were prepared in September 1942 in the last moment Antonezko changed his mind I listed here the names of three people who acted in this direction to save the Jews from southern Transylvania then we had the expulsion of Jews from Sigišava by the Romanian gender group they were expelled to northern Transylvania to some sacred settlements Odorheu, Cepulia and so on and they ended up in the ghetto of Tirmulurech in May 1944 and they arrived in Auschwitz as well Dieter Schlesa the German writer this time depotation the executions in this phase of the Holocaust in Northern Transylvania carried out by the Hungarian army had so to be mentioned the attack of September 1944 in Czarmasz 126 victims killed in one night in a German spot also in Ruduš, 17 victims in Arach, 6 victims and so on and so forth they took the number of lost lives in southern Transylvania during the Holocaust between 1 and 2000 so 40,000 Jews in northern Transylvania survived the Holocaust now, the conclusion 40th of the northern Transylvanian Jews representing two states of the whole Transylvanian Jewry buried in the Holocaust and now to make a connection with the space that was delivered by Mr. Rupac the survivors of the Holocaust of Transylvania returned to their homeland in 1945 and of course they were very marked by the tragic events and some of them wrote their memories about camps and about these tragic events of the Transylvania of the Transylvanian Holocaust some put their memories in a documentary record form and others use literary means or tools to immortalize these catastrophes so you have translated today for you a small passage from one of the first books to memorize to memorize the Holocaust in northern Transylvania written by a lawyer called Otto Kornisch the title of the book was Fish which did Smoke and was published by Minerva in Georgian 1945 I will read you this it's about the feeling of Kornisch and he was liberated in Dörnheim it was called Dörnheim was called Dörnheim and he describes his own feelings the boys laughed I am not laughing alone what is this unpleasant feeling inside me I close my eyes and hold my fellow prisoners tightly it seems to me that I am standing again beside the Auschwitz tracks that rainy morning a year ago I can see my mother standing in a line moving to the left in her black overcoat I can see her brave face as she is nodding towards me I can feel the warmth of my father's hand hands and as we are saying goodbye when our hands parts for him to move to the left and for me to move to the right and I can still see the immense cloud of smoke in the sky the smoke as it spreads across the entire riser about the concentration as it spreads across our entire past and future to cast its dark shadow upon our entire life this is in 1945 Ibrahim Kertis wrote text with such profoundness about the Holocaust but 30 years later that the smoke will be will spread across our entire past and future to cast its dark shadow upon our entire life and another very early literary is still not a but is the preface that the journalist Belajor wrote to the memoir of his fellow journalist from in here the memoir Belajor in the stone that appeared in 1946 Belajor sent the author on behalf of the material journalism and quotation on behalf of the death and those living for the memory of the death for memory in his book the tragedy now short quotation sets a memorial to all those who were denied even a mass grave but who will cross the european sky as low lying clouds until the tapestry of heaven spreads and the numbs day comes as the author of the preface states there is nothing left of the world of Moravia the easy city of Ishtar the western city of the city of our youth ambitions love, joy and happiness it is all gone so this is another text in which the clouds the mass grave were even denied even a mass grave but who will forever float across the european sky as low lying clouds now you wonder why the young man behind the couch is starting to research such a question they already mentioned because his clouds will float always from earth sky there is no world there is no earth for us we have to confront this history in order to i am coming back to the beginning in order to avoid such a political system we cannot be sure that such a political system cannot appear again thank you for your help first of all i want to thank you for giving us this important presentation of the hub data that is so relevant in relation to Transylvania Holocaust because we are here i will talk about something else i will move somehow the discussion to the issue presentation of the Holocaust and how it's already here thanks and how the Holocaust survivors thought about rebuilding a Jewish culture and art after the Holocaust so there are all these reflections that existed i think i will just to be back here at transit house a place that i can say that i grew up with since the 90s i even directed my first my very first theater performance right here i mean like 18 years ago and i have an image from that from this year and we used to call this place the Sima and i think this name is still used in Khrush i will not insist on how important this place is for many of us and i just wish for many happy returns but what i will talk about tonight is this certain local history but also reflection on our condition and options as independent artists nowadays and i think that is a very important issue issue that was brought by this presentation we will focus mainly on how iKUF theater or uncoordinated has left this cultural movement that focused on the holocaust trauma and has put the artistic foundation to what would become the Jewish State Theater in 1948 in a okay program from one of their shows it's shortly of existence left a legacy that had long-term effects on the intricate transformation of the Jewish theater in Romania first of all one of the key issues regarding holocaust and theater is the question of representation how is it possible if it is possible to represent it unthinkable and what are its effects even in 2022 the question of representation of the holocaust is still debated by practitioners by scholars by theoreticians is a controversial matter with many implications of both here of where the limits between entertainment and historical accuracy can be put if artists can freely learn the line between fact and art this paper my paper looks into that historical debate on how the traumatic history affected and influenced the production of Jewish theater in Romania starting in 1944 how it affected its repertoire the practice and how the dramatic changes of Jewish communities in Romania created a local artistic movement that a specific way to work with catastrophic memory in a historical moment that was perceived at its true importance and led to new institutions and new aesthetics that are still at work today in my opinion the need for an artistic form in order to understand and cope with recent historical trauma for Jewish artists in Romania I did not follow Adorno's famous statement from 1949 on the barbarism of writing poetry after Auschwitz the idea of the aesthetic size in politics culture and art followed the fear of a style of destruction of a fear of giving aesthetic meaning to the unthinkable yet art creates an unreality effect in a way that is not alienating or desensitizing at best it also provides something of a safe house for emotion and equity that tears we shed are an acknowledgement and not an exploitation of the best as Joe Freed defends the function of the Holocaust based art and the first Ikuv performances directly addressed a commentary and primary trauma in a way that was necessary for the art maker's also Josep Perco which at the other pretty director of the former wrote in January 1943 a presentation for a conference and it was called Faces and masks from all the modern Jewish theater this minus three talks about the Jewish theater identified from the start with the Jewish actor as a sick person but not dead yet while the words are flowers brought to the bed of the forgotten sufferer this is January 1943 in Bucharest discussing a history of Jewish theater in Miniat and legacy of Abraham Goldfaden Perkovich ends his lecture with a strong message against all of you for him while he was on stage he never felt alone because in some theater performances the spectator cannot separate the living from the dead on stage scared you decide for the face lines the facial bones covering a green and yellow stage line in a hallucinatory collegiate school while reading this document that was not published yet I remember the reaction of a Holocaust survivor from Transnistria watching a dramatization of his autobiographical novel performing a Jewish theater in Bucharest he was able to truly see his dead parents on stage as they were as he knew them identifying you the director who is giving stage directions you see Perkovich once more pathos from the actors he says your acting should burn the theater I want the theater in flames mentioning the end of the first act from the book Perkovich sees the actor crossing the stage as an opener of the heavens an earth gate impressing all the pain in the world through the lines in English a life has died a new life needs to be lived regarding the title of this presentation the period after August 1944 is described in the essential volume 100 years of Jewish theater in Romania by Perkovich as under the same roof but beneath a clear sky this book Israela Perkovich played a crucial role in the development of the Jewish theater after 1944 he was part of the quintessentially Kuf initiative in Bottosan which developed the very first performance Nahtok or Night Day as a reflection on the holocaust a few months before August 1944 and worked as the literary secretary of the Jewish State Theater in bookers from 1955 to 1982 Israela Perkovich the metaphor of the room is used in relation to permanent location and building for Jewish theater he reflects on the chonalization of the Jewish State Theater and how the previous initiative contributed to this national recognition of the cultural value of the Jewish State Perkovich calls the post of 1944 development a new history of the Jewish theater that breaks through the past but at the same time maintains a strong connection to local historians buildings and locations authors like E.T. Grubin and S.C. Christian mention this strong material historical history that connects to the present through certain spaces built with meaning Christian writes in the purpose of the Jewish theater from Yasha's short history from 1947 Grubin left his heart there around the Green Tree Garden even nowadays that was the pilgrimage destination for America to see like Grubin the boards on which their ancestors moved for them to see the garden where Godfather like a militian troubadour said their poetic and anti-acidic pamphlets on stage both in daily clothes and top hats in front of the working proletariat from the winning streets and crude little houses of Grubin for his late nostalgia but I understand him because I too, when I happen to be in Yasha, near the rundown fences of the Green Tree I stop and look carefully at the glorious stage which steals my mind like Grubin's and takes me away ready to mist my eyes for its past as well as for our past of those back then both gone forever growing by Maxi of Godfather this is not an isolated thought in Poland for example Christophe Lenartowicz I'm not sure that pronounced correctly analyzed how Holocaust museums function for the visitors in terms of representation and education nowadays how architecture interacts with emotions, intellects of those who are in a certain location that is filled with historical meaning that is connected to the viewer's previous knowledge is that the physical structure shapes behaviors and is perceived through senses architecture is an essentially abstract and non-representative art is unable to render historical images what it can do however is to evoke then in the viewer's imagination personal associations and the knowledge of history those spaces that remind a visitor of a certain tragic history can produce a spiraling identification reactions that are similar or identical to the living experience of the witnesses of the real events that the person in that particular space might only heard of or made part of their own past for his right back of each the metaphor of the theater building is connected to the first truth of Godfather's theater from Otto Schatt even if the very first Yiddish theater was established in Yash in an open air location the very first roof Yiddish was this theater where the first performance in 1944 in Yiddish night day took place so Godfather performed here in 1876 and in 1944 night day took place months before the August because a few thousand although not after Romanian and German are in control this particular situation encouraged artists for organizing Botoshan and theater troupe under the umbrella of the Income Cultural Association established those days in Botoshan that was founded by professionals and amateur theater makers Israel Berkovich, a young theater enthusiast from Botoshan took part in developing this first performance that had just a few representations with the full house the format of the performance is significant also because the following performance is about the Holocaust, all of the concert the two parts, the night and the day we're following the recent dark past and the enthusiasm for the bright future this performance included songs sung until yesterday by singers and public from the labor camps and songs that were inspired by the new political situation and represented a historical moment or with this as modest as symbolic theatrical engagement the threat of the Jewish theater tradition in Romania was re-mounted in new conditions the theme of the night is connected to the Holocaust in two crucial instances of works that are based on direct Holocaust experiences for example, Elie Wiesel's memoirs, Night and Ludwig Brugstein's play The Night Shed, the very first performance of the Jewish State Theater from August 1948 that created the story based on the idea of the night work done in the Auschwitz crematorium by Sunder Kommando prisoners and in the socialist factory by both workers and Holocaust survivors starting with 1944, a new perspective on the Jewish theater and the idea of the state supported its execution, emerging in a new context the following months after August 44 the Jewish theater was not able to create large events the surviving theater makers were returning from camps and forced labor for various locations all over media, developing communications and basic needs to create our collectings but even at that time Jewish artists organized public performance events containing mainly poems and folk songs fragments from classical Jewish literature new songs and literary works that were reflecting the recent suffering and hopes for a better future in Bucharest the KUFA association managed to receive legal recognition and started to organize libraries lectures they KUFA Blatter magazine and a theatrical committee that planned to establish a new Jewish art theater in 1945 already the KUFA theater was functioning as an ensemble of professional actors and young students who were trained to become actors all under the supervision of the director and actor Jakob Mazdov after only six months of existence the self-described major cultural factor in the life of Jewish people in Romania the KUFA theater organized a long tour in 1946 with its two performances that made in Transylvania although performing in 27 cities including Bruges their successful tour was organized together with the Jewish democratic community and its local organization was organizations that was met with a warm welcome for the authentic ambassadors of arts and culture the self-presentation of the KUFA theater the time is relevant they see themselves as these messengers of progressive Yiddishan culture in a working process of cultural and artistic perfection under the guidance of the great artist Jakob Mazdov in a similar self-presentation of the Transylvanian leg of the tour a detail of the specificity of the Russian audience emphasizes the impact of IHLEF performance IHLEF means I live over the still unhealed wounds of the Jewish population of Transylvania that suffers so much the performances of the KUFA theater spread a soothing path and constitute an incentive in the recovery world that this much tried populations it needs to the audience's reaction to the lifting of the curtain of the IHLEF show on which the slogan I'm Israel High is printed was downright shocking the plan for the future was even greater the time they were rehearsing a golemic comedy in front of finder they were preparing new performances the sources by Goldfather Stan Peckin by Alec and a new dramatization by Mansdor but also a new surprise review and they were keeping a strong connection to the traditional Jewish theater and the well-known authors except for IHLEF there are a few signs of a new realist perspective actually in terms of dramaturgy but a strong connection to traditional audiences that have to be seduced took install returning to hookers from the tour because theater wanted to be a crowd-feasor and kept a strong connection in their audiences who were also supporting financially their existence we have no doubt that the return of the IHLEF theater would be greeted with the same warmth by the Jewish population of hookers who contributed so much to the establishment and maintenance of this art and culture settled as well as the shows in Transylvania and Moldova the first Jewish performances after the war in various locations in Europe had a tremendous impact on the spectators as well as on actors on stage Jan Schwarz researched some of the first performances in Poland after the war and he describes the electric hemisphere in the IHLEF theaters spectators and actors looking at each other for minutes unable to stop crying without any words they were just doing this form of commission in 1946 Jakob Manstorff published a report after the first year of IHLEF theater an account of its activities in his own style Manstorff outbids the role of the small theater that he artistically manages and creates a continuity to the rest traumatic past if we say that our young group became known to the popular Jewish masses in Romania it would perhaps be quite long as we said because our theater brought joy, pride and at the same time comfort to the Jewish population after the tragic events that happened in this report Manstorff mainly emphasizes the role of the first official of IHLEF a game changer in the existing theatrical offer of the time we play the great sufferings that our people went through during this tragic period of oppression and from which the Jewish viewer left with the pride of being a Jew feeling the strength of his ancestry that makes him resist and survive all the great trials the show brought comfort and encouragement in that people's further struggle against the forces of darkness for human rights the program of the performance for the 1945 1946 season gives some significant clues in positioning that IHLEF performs in a specific moment of its creation most of us, the president of the IHLEF association writes the introduction of nothing less than a political and artistic program for the new initiative and the comedy style IHLEF is set into action after reclaiming both others legacy acts of existing Jewish companies which at that time were very performing abilities for following their own path in this opinion after the Goldfaden Goldfaden the Jewish stage was invented by place of older nature than the English language so classically qualifies as Shun Tien the public country there made great fun of this place without content, without taste of literary sense in such direction the Jewish theater supposedly developed to become a strong tool in educating the masses with examples such as the Vilna troupe in Jacobo Stenberg's theater from the 30s in Bucharest from Monish Park's edition of Coast Theater in New York of course the Yiddish state theaters from the Soviet Union the historical moment of 1945 is considered without any reservation to be a more important one for opening an Yiddish theater than 70 years ago when Goldfaden established Yiddish theater in Yash the opening of Jewish cultural institutions with two performances directly addressed to the Holocaust three years ago besides Yiddish theater the future Jewish state theater opened its first season in August 1948 with a light change and this this process has a deeper meaning which Lex explains it clearly today however the important communities in France Germany, Hungary and Slovakia are nothing but pale shadows when the media has the truth in Poland Lithuania with their cultural tradition and with their great press publishing institutions with their multiple schools that were ours Yiddish culture when the combat Jewish population of Ukraine the only country where Yiddish was recognized as an official language also felt almost entirely to the fascist murderers of people it falls on us the Jews of Romania the most compact Jewish community in Europe apart from the Soviet Union the great moral duty towards the small groups of Jews saved from other countries as well as the worst of future generations to create cultural institutions to form a center of culture for the Jewish masses throughout Europe so this was the plan somehow following the same argument in language structure if so Shakira explains in connection to the performance he played the historical moment was to be seized and not in a chaotic way Shakira rejects a return to short theater or the older theater that the pre-war Jews were used to how nostalgic about as the good old days that are gone forever he contests the actor's argument that they would like to change the theatrical style but the public demands such performances otherwise they would not come to the theater even if Romania and Yiddish theater was considered backwards compared to other Jewish theater companies the models are the same Yiddish Yiddish theater did not have Yiddish theater from all the Morris Yiddish Coast theater like or you mentioned Piatron Paris those performances in Romania were back with great interest and enthusiasm and inspired local theater makers such as Jacob Strelberg to save the oppressed Jewish art and to create a cultural center with local elements in Romania in the 30s it had a very strong influence also on the Romania theater because it became the totally different style of acting and constructing the performance this theatrical history and trajectory changed dramatically when the war-like black cloud darkened the Jewish cycle as Yiddish said Shakira gives an account of the Holocaust in extremely personal manner in the brutal performance that exposes the best reality of an extermination care again from the Ukrainian territory in Yiddish but the contrast focuses on the camp resistance and the fight over the Jewish and Ukrainian partisans outside the camp Shakira performs the statistic Gestapo boss Johan von Kander his account of the Holocaust can be read also through the effort of creating a difficult and emotional role in 1945 he said Minna's Jewish souls were destroyed by Hitler's peace cultural treasure created by the generation to labor and unimaginable hardships were reduced to ashes what is left in Poland of the three and a half million Jews of which 400,000 were in Warsaw alone there are hardly 100,000 left in Warsaw at most 5,000 of the more than 200 Jewish theater that existed there are very few left in Europe today of the countless Jewish theater troops in Poland only Iona Sturckow and Diana Ruse remain like two powers of the past ages they stormed the cities spreading the Jewish word and gathering around them the concerts, the marching Polish Jewry the second part of his article changes at all and becomes optimistic restoring his trust in humanity and the great future it is not the time to cry out in the rays of European Jewry the future belongs only to the one who fights and builds a new life on the juice of Romania falls the great responsibility and priceless duty to save a Jewish culture for that and for the Jewry of the whole of Europe the perspective of positioning themselves as Jewish artists in a international context with global responsibilities is a particularity of an international group of theater makers that are fully conscious of their mission towards the Jewish community that they perform for as well as the words other fellow artists and all of us survivors Shakira is aware of the fact that the resources are extremely limited for succeeding and the work that they have to do can only be collected his last point expresses nevertheless the trust in an optimistic humanist approach that will become the main form of artistic and political consciousness for Jewish artists in Romania for the following years the Jewish theater must get around itself all the forces for the new and victorious ideas of our time for the formation of heroic and fighting consciousness that fill the emotions and attitudes of a free world concerning the river power even if the rest of the performances are based on classical Jewish plays the muscle keeps them on twist even the classical character that he got is a model survivor who speaks to the president he said that he was seen like by the mighty oak whose roots are beautifully rooted in the mother earth and which does not let itself be banned by the heavy storms that have sent the boy the faith dealt heavy blows to take it by his robust optimism straightens his spine by suffering and he moves forward for a new scoreboard with faith in a better tomorrow the show which was performed at Barra Sheldon received enthusiasm in reviews and reviews are the ever-scorched new paper as it was written in these reviews what the critics appreciate was not only the new artistic form but also the educational role that they have wanted to play educating the audiences to enjoy what that model is called the art theater judging by the full houses and the warm reaction of the audiences what was missing at the time in the cultural environment was the specific approach of the theater such as the theatrical ensemble of a high artistic level and it was called in these reviews the successful performance is actually made to a score who received as a visionary director, actor and manager but also who is dedicated to the creator of a world that's suitable music for us the stage design that are given as a toy in a complete manner the actors definitely are horrible last of the years like Shakira and so on one critic Sanin writes that what he saw on stage was not just a performance but a moment of sharing called the drama person the drama of the Jun Tevye while Mantho of the Jun Tevye was not just an amazing performer but the Jun himself who knows how to receive with such great spirit all the stresses and the pain Mantho is connected to the performance to the recent suffering of the audience and produced a strong reaction Mr. Mantho opened the book of millennial Jewish feeling to one of those wonderful pages which really revealed the human condition of the eternal university in the Jun but who under the third bear attached hope carries everywhere with him a warm heart a charming understanding of destiny an important place in the construction of the conflict in this particular performance was the scene of the failover the local authorities later the Ukrainian presence led by the oppressed priest to enter Tevye's yard in order to start the riot against the Jewish community but they are convinced that Tevye was an innocent man so they do not need to practice what they have intended in an interview from January 1946 Mantho explains why he used music in specific performances an unusual choice at the time for an Aleichem performance in Vienna because we got help from music that the idea of this works stands out more in them the beauty of nature for which state in such a generation acquires more value to the music and poetry of the songs the music emphasizes the conflict emphasizing the seriousness at the right time Mantho perceived the role of music in performing the story and the effects that he wanted to achieve were not accessible directly the artist therefore cannot create an accessible atmosphere that the music could use giving an example of a scene of music in the building atmosphere or speaking of a message Mantho opens the door to his creative process a rare occasion considering all the ecoped documents and testimonies regarding his identity in Romania but standing by a window with her eyes fixed on the distance where her law are suffering when asked where he is answers with a single word sitting the silence of the tomb when overwhelmed by the pressure of the situation is deepened by the subtle sounds of music the melody of the Russian sound of prisoners of the Siberian taiga Nevertheless, the usage of music in a certain way is a political act and Mantho refuses this occasion to attack the local entertainment business he said the role of music so because of that, his purpose is trivial when his creative character is in the air for the momentary entertainment of the specific behaviors our music has the mission of the daiga who penetrates into the depths of the human soul gathering the nuances of feelings to present them as a portal out of the woods and also where he is the right place to make his political opinion is clear he said in Soviet Russia where the size of the theaters is high as it be both dramas and tragedies are represented by music this is in accordance with the principle of the diarrhea in the school of science whose student I had the honor to contact when asked about the general failure of the Greek government and Jewish theater brokers with no outcome results inside Mantho explained that the effort did not follow the realistic line but he had maintained his trust in the audience even if he was surprised that his language was not well known in the chorus he admits that the audience reacted extremely well to a digital performance on stage but later he wore another either Mantho complained that he would not find the Jewish actor to join his company or after his own son in 1946 he had an act of ensemble and when he had the report that asked the usual question about the future he showed that he had told some of his children showing the ensemble at the same time he did not know the local Jewish organizations and cultural names very well and they offer him constant surprises he said, I might not say it it is a disappointment it is about the connection of Jewish organizations and institutions to the theater I haven't encountered this in any other country I don't understand why these Jewish culture centers keep all the flaws for Mantho's role plays a second-tier role bringing the audience to the performances because they already know that they find it hard and to give them new content that brings new political ideas a new update in the setting and a new side of that thing even what he calls the client-coast form is the employee is showing the prejudice and obedience of the whole world like in the show based on the parents' identity the almost complete extinction of Jewish life in Poland regarding a performance based on Godfather's writing Mantho explains his approach in a very direct way we will expect to retain all the dignity tests of Godfather yet the show will be filtered to a light and a smiling irony if we succeed in realizing the colorful and joyful show we are projecting it will certainly be a great achievement for our young ensemble that grows and evolves artistically from one performance to another one can already know it's traces of an ensemble that has a certain specific physiology but he said it to the end it is worse in going in front of the Jewish spectators with performances that they enjoy and they immediately react to tragic or cheerful stories that talk to their whole condition the desire show to play in the anticipated surprise function Mantho performed Godfather's soul stress in drag he sang, danced performed flow of life in a show that as an unknown reviewer role makes you laugh a happy laugh for yet for a few hours today for more in Bucharest and in India for other big problems Mantho and Mantho or other Mantho makes us laugh with tears when he shows us the devout way or other pretty sorcerers prove that he who understood his mission and offered to the audiences an accessible type of theater a positive impression of our everyday reality it was not like in art it was pure content a popular show which deserves to be seen even by the most demanding extent if any of the performance had not been the idea of political issues or serious matters it managed to serve its purpose Mantho from another review, does anyone protest? No when Mantho manages to give us such a wish as Baba Yajna he meant that he himself was a wizard maintaining a political and a steady strong position against others to which they by initiatives and cultural organizations in India Mantho presented himself in a direct connection to the local Jewish community that had seen his support that he meant his art that initiative and assistance throughout our existence that he might include in our society keeps our theater alive with great difficulty these duties fulfilled all by our audience whom I am only now getting to know better and I would like to applaud them with the likeliest appreciation by shouting Bravo is certain what the Jewish public wanted was unbreakable we are sure that we will find this spectator of ours the same encouragement and love that will enrich us towards new and richer artistic achievements Ekof theater was noticed by critics since IHLE which was made the barricade play one critic UB thinks that what this young artistic ensemble does is more than a theater and an art in general it is a school of cultural and artistic consciousness their performances are not seen as bestsellers even if Mantho might suggest otherwise they do not bring a rush of spectators who want to complete their CSR with a preferably trivial, easy piece with a preferably innocent dance and it doesn't even bring to the theater the average crowd that comes to cry cheating at a theater to melodrama or laugh out loud in a comedy with situations stitched with rope what Ekof theater has to offer in this theatrical new context is nothing less than a substantial and victor Jewishness with the purest and highest spiritual the same the same article which does not mean aesthetic refining that is not understood by the audience but the form of performance that demands frontal direct contact to the spectator which would mean avoiding literature as some shows are theoretically called Ekof is caught in a process of helping the spectators to demand what the overacting companies used to do on stage those companies criticized by the master were considered in a sense of a cheap repertoire non-cultural, non-esthetic and not only one's enemy of artistic and moral common sense even if melodrama and midlife performance middle performance are considered useful in the preparation of a good art spectator the excess of using that style and promoting non-artistic and trivial plays is not justified by the lack of funds and the usage of the spectator's lower instincts as they call it nevertheless, we understand that when you are not supported by the state or any private institution you cannot make only major art against the need for daily bread but you will be things that there are possibilities to combine those conditions in one repertoire as Ekof managed there example should be followed by other Jewish companies who have higher responsibilities than their material existence we expect other talented elements of other troops to understand their duties beyond their values like they used the other ensemble of these hands nevertheless the lack of funds and support as well as conflicts with other Jewish theater companies led Jakob Manstor to abandon to abandon the group after only two years of intensive living most of the ensemble follow him and the new collective was formed under the same name but with a new team and a limited artistic impact Manstor left Romania and his former colleagues lost contact with him he died there in 1955 in Zimbabwe but it's great but Kustiander was remembered as a model company and it influenced the artistic direction of the two Jewish state theater established in 1948 and 1949 I think I will close here maybe give just a short thought on this period so what I was talking about in 1947 and there are various transformations afterwards including the project of the Jewish state theater in Niasz which had a different approach than the Jewish state theater in Bucharest and so on the Jewish state theater in Niasz functioned for only 14 years the Jewish state theater in Bucharest is still active it has a permanent company and these are all effects these new aesthetics get up here and new directions are all effects in my opinion of what he called breakthrough cheap and failed so in a sense besides this conflict between different aesthetics and acting choices which is a conflict with victims definitely the most difficult challenge for British theater makers was how to position themselves in a political landscape that changed dramatically and was a continuous transformation of the 1944 the Jewish communities were themselves changing rapidly and the whole situation was radically different from what was perceived as a Jewish life for the world some of the Yiddish artists abandoned their activities and left the country some who remained active in the production of Jewish culture held an equilibrium embracing the ideas of all embracing the ideas of optimistic humanism as a political position that they could connect to the darkness of the past and the struggle against fascist regimes in this sense the performances produced by Ikuv gave a certain style of approaching difficult topics on stage filtering the existing cultural activities through the traumatic experiences of the Holocaust and act accordingly even if mostly forgotten by everyone the theater environment was completely erased from the cultural memory the performative process and the Holocaust in Romania still ways to be discovered and the local archives contained documents that can speak to us today and give a fragmented image of incredible struggles to tell the story of the Holocaust and the years after thank you so now if there are some questions from the audience to me or Professor Ikuv I cannot see you in this light but what I present is part of a larger research that I'm still working on and it's just a very small piece and I think it's still a lot there is a lot of material to be discovered in local archives in Romania and and I think that this story is as I said there are companies forgotten can speak to us and can can give us this perspective of how to rebuild or how to get through after catastrophe, after tragedy it's an unimaginable tragedy that we are talking about so in a sense all these approaches that I have this optimistic thought in 1945 and the years after including in 1970 when there is also in the Patriotic theater there is the criticism of this period of the socialist realism of how people in Vankovic calls them a product of this sociological performance that he rejects in the 70s and even this movement a more traditional type of theater or a return to gold and the old style is not necessarily a form of rejection of this type of performances that Vankovic did as I gave you some examples they were working with this tradition with this historical Yiddish theater that they were somehow reclaiming in a new way so this conflict that appears a lot in literature between new aesthetics and old aesthetics is not necessarily true in their perspective at the time so I think I was wrong here so so thank you if you have a question someone can check with the book if it is written or if it is written if not then thank you thank you for your attention and we will keep a little 15 minutes so that people can have a good time so if there is a new question that you came and please stay for another one hour to look at some serious right on the ring 3, 4