Theresienstadt Concentration Camp - Cultural Activity of Inmates

Cultural Activity of Inmates

Theresienstadt was originally designated to be seen to house middle class Jews from Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Austria. Many educated Jews were inmates of Theresienstadt, and in a propaganda effort designed to fool the Western allies, the camp was publicized by the Nazis for its rich cultural life: "During the early period there were no (musical) instruments whatsoever, and the cultural life came to develop itself only ... when the whole management of Theresienstadt was steered into an organized course". At least four concert orchestras existed in the camp, as well as chamber groups and jazz ensembles. Several stage performances were produced and attended by camp inmates. Many prominent artists from Czechoslovakia, Austria, and Germany were imprisoned there. There were artists, writers, scientists, jurists, diplomats, musicians, and scholars.

The community in Theresienstadt tried to ensure that all the children who passed through the camp continued with their education. Though the Nazis decreed that all camp children over a certain age must be gainfully employed, working on stage was considered employment, and the children's education often continued under the guise of work or cultural activity. Daily classes and sports activities were held and the magazine Vedem was edited there. This affected some 15,000 children, of whom no more than 1,000 survived to the end of the war. Other estimates place the number of the surviving children as low as 100.

The camp served as a place of internment for conductor Rafael Schächter, who formed a chorus within the camp and gave a performance of the massive and complex Requiem by Giuseppe Verdi. Schächter would go on to conduct 13 more performances of the work within the chorus before his eventual deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Julius Stwertka, violinist and a former leading member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and co-leader of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra perished in the camp on December 17, 1942.

Martin Roman and Coco Schumann were part of the "Ghetto Swingers" jazz band.

Artist and art teacher Friedl Dicker-Brandeis created drawing classes for children in the ghetto to whom she also taught Hana Brady (Hana's suitcase). This activity resulted in the production of over four thousand children's drawings, which Dicker-Brandeis hid in two suitcases before being sent to Auschwitz. This collection was thus preserved from destruction by the Nazis and was not discovered until a decade later. Most of these drawings can now be seen at The Jewish Museum in Prague, whose Archive of the Holocaust section is responsible for the administration of the Terezín Archive Collection. Others are on display at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. The children of the camp also wrote stories and poems, some of which were preserved and later published in a collection called I Never Saw Another Butterfly, taken from the poem by young Jewish Czech poet Pavel Friedman who was deported to Terezín on April 26, 1942 and later died at Auschwitz.

Painter Malva Schalek (Malvina Schalkova) was deported to Theresienstadt in February 1942. She produced more than 100 drawings and watercolors portraying life in the camp. Because of her refusal to portray a collaborationist doctor, she was deported to Auschwitz 18 May 1944, where she was murdered.

Likewise, artist and architect Norbert Troller produced drawings and watercolors of life inside Theresienstadt, to be smuggled to the outside world. When the Gestapo found out, he was arrested and deported to Auschwitz. His memoirs and two dozen of his artworks were published in 1991.

The composer Viktor Ullmann was interned in September 1942 and died at Auschwitz in October 1944. He composed some twenty works at Theresienstadt, including the one-act opera, Der Kaiser von Atlantis (The Emperor of Atlantis or The Refusal of Death), first performed in 1975, shown in full on BBC television in Britain, and still performed today. It was to be performed in the camp, but permission was withdrawn when it was in rehearsal, probably because the authorities perceived its allegorical intent. Another composer who died in Theresienstadt was Zikmund Schul.

Inmates at the concentration camp composed the music on Terezín: The Music 1941–44, a 2-CD set released in 1991. It contains chamber music by Gideon Klein, Viktor Ullmann, and Hans Krása, the children's opera Brundibár by Krása, and songs by Ullmann and Pavel Haas. All the composers died in the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1944, except for Klein, who died the following year in Fürstengrube. Many of the works were written at the end of their lives, in 1943 and 1944.

Canadian musician Ruth Fazal has composed Oratorio Terezin, a full-length production scored for orchestra, children's choir, adult choir, and three vocal soloists. The oratorio is based on children's poetry from Terezín combined with passages from the Hebrew scriptures. It premiered in Toronto in November 2003, and subsequently visited concert halls in Prague, Brno, Vienna and Bratislava during March 2004. In May 2005 a tour of Israel included Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Karmiel, and it was the main cultural event of Holocaust Memorial Day in Tel Aviv on May 5, 2005. The US premiere took place in February 2007 at the Tilles Centre on Long Island, and at Carnegie Hall, New York City.

In 2007, the Swedish singer Anne Sofie von Otter released a CD of music composed in Theresienstadt, assisted by baritone Christian Gerhaher, pianists and chamber musicians. In 2008, Austrian baritone Wolfgang Holzmair, and American pianist Russell Ryan, presented a recital that drew on a different selection of songs.