People Who Inspire Us:
Marie Rolshoven

Denk Mal am Ort, the powerful program in which Germans open their homes to publicly remember the Jewish families who once lived there, wasn’t Obermayer Award winner Marie Rolshoven’s idea. Rolshoven founded the program in Berlin with her mother, the late artist and political scientist Jani Pietsch, in 2016. But it wasn’t Jani’s idea, either.  

It began with Denise Citroen, who lived in a home in Amsterdam that had been built by a Jewish architect for himself and his family. One day, the architect’s family members knocked on her door. They had come from Israel, they told her. Would it be all right if they looked around? That encounter sparked the idea for Open Jewish Homes, in which current residents honor Jewish families each May around the anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands during World War II. 

Marie lives in Schöneburg, a district of Berlin that once was home to a thriving Jewish community. When she and Jani became interested in learning what happened to the people who had lived in their apartment building, Jani avidly took up the research. She found 20 names from their eight-unit building, including nine from their own apartment. All 20 had been killed by the Nazis. “We wanted to remember these persons,” Marie says. 

"You Can't Do That in Berlin."

Marie, a filmmaker, photographer, and artist, has worked since 2012 with the Silent Heroes Memorial Center in Berlin, which commemorates Jews who resisted Nazi persecution and the people who helped them. Through that work, she learned about Open Jewish Homes. 

“Denise said, you know, you could do this in Berlin,” Marie recalls. Marie liked the idea, but others weren’t optimistic. “People said ‘You can’t do that in Berlin. Nobody will open their house,’” she says. “But Jani said of course we can do it.” So they started planning. 

Denk Mal am Ort is a German play on words. It means both “memorial at this place” and “think about this place.” The program functions on three levels, making it a challenge to organize but also very compelling for participants. The first involves locating residences where Jews once lived, and finding current residents who are willing to open their homes. “When we contact people, we always ask, maybe it’s possible to remember in… the hallway, so they can get used to us,” says Marie with a laugh.  

The second is creating a presentation about the families, usually photos and stories about the people who lived there. This is especially powerful when survivors or their families come to participate.

And the third involves the general public, who learn in detail about the Jewish life that once took place in their community. “The first time we did it, Jani and I were a bit excited,” she recalls. Would anyone come? When they opened the door to their own apartment, more than 200 people came through. “We met a lot of neighbors,” she says, but also students, residents of other neighborhoods, and even tourists. (They had advertised on a “Things to do in Berlin” website.)

Since Jani passed away in 2020, Marie has taken on much of the organizing work. After a one-year break due to the pandemic, Denk Mal am Ort has grown exponentially. In 2024, it consisted of 60 separate events in four cities: Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, and Frankfurt. Each city holds its events on the weekend closest to the date it was liberated by the Allied armies, from early April to mid-May. 

What makes Denk Mal am Ort so powerful —and popular — is the homes. “You are exactly in the place where people used to live,” Marie said in accepting her 2024 Obermayer Award. “This is the doorknob that people who lived there before also held in their hands. They used the same staircase. They were in the same kitchen. When people come there, they get into a discussion immediately,” she says. “Together, they commemorate those who used to live there, and that is very emotional.”

More: See the short film about Marie Rolshoven and read more about her work and accomplishments.