Dialogues in Sobibor. Discussion and guided tour of the Museum and Memorial Site in Sobibór.

Event program

During the workshops held at the Museum and Memorial Site in Sobibór, the authors of the commemoration project, members of the Formy Wspólne Foundation, presented the process of its creation over a period of over 10 years. They talked about the consultations and negotiations on design solutions, conducted among others with the Rabbinical Commission for Cemeteries, representatives of the families of victims from the Netherlands, representatives of the Yad Vashem Institute and members of the international Steering Committee, composed of representatives of Poland, Israel, the Netherlands and Slovakia, which supervised the entire process until the beginning of construction. On this occasion, the authors explained, among other things, how important it is when designing places associated with trauma and suffering, especially minority groups, to listen to arguments and reasons other than our own and introduce them into the commemoration project, which builds mutual trust and allows all interested and involved parties to have a sense of joint ownership and joint responsibility for the place. Then the participants of the meeting, including: social activists, students, researchers of cultural studies and anthropology, and architecture practitioners, shared their feelings and reflections on the commemoration itself – how they perceive it, what associations it evokes, what made the greatest impression on them and whether, in their opinion, the commemoration project shows the effects of these long discussions and consultations. The workshops in Sobibór were organized by the Formy Wspólne Foundation in cooperation with the Museum in Sobibór.