Obermayer Award Winners 2022
Read their stories, see a short film on each one, and watch the awards ceremony broadcast
A former displaced persons camp, a complex history
What happened to the survivors when the Nazi concentration camps closed? Citizens for the Badehaus shines a light on a little-known history and has connected with a generation of children born to Holocaust survivors as they reclaimed their lives.
“I have to do something so that children’s first contact with Judaism is not the [Holocaust].”
Meet Shlomit Tripp, with her puppet Shlomo and his friends. Their fun-loving shows are adored by children and adults alike, all while demystifying Jewish culture and normalizing intercultural relationships.
“The things that happened to…others are happening today.”
Christof Pies helped found Friends of the Laufersweiler Synagogue in 1989. Since then, he and the association have researched the history of rural Jews who lived in the area, created a vibrant study center, and imbued many young people with an understanding of the need to stand up for what’s right.
A Refuge, a greenhouse, a place to confront the past
Treibhaus started as a refuge for young people in an area where Neo-Nazi violence pervaded youth clubs. Today, it’s a vibrant gathering place with intergenerational support. Meanwhile, they are helping rewrite their town’s history and shining a light on a past many people did not want exposed.
“It is very important to deal with this darkest chapter honestly”
Josef Wisskirchen has spent a lifetime helping people understand the truth. What began with a startled realization that a synagogue still stood in his home town turned into decades of research and writing, and connecting with survivors and descendants.
Finding history in forgotten places
In German, Zeitlupe means slow motion, and the Zeitlupe project takes a measured approach to everything it does, whether working with teenagers or nursing students on historical and ethical topics—or turning a former concentration camp for women into a place of remembrance.
