Los Angeles Museum Of The Holocaust And The Wallis Present VOICES OF HISTORY

Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust and The Wallis present "Voices of History," Friday, July 26, at 4 p.m. at Lovelace Studio Theater at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts. The production is the culmination of the museum's Voices of History summer theater workshop for middle and high school students.

During the workshop, the Los Angeles-area students met with survivors Edith Frankie and Paul Kester and worked with museum staff to create the original theater piece inspired by the survivors' experiences. The production is directed by Ann Noble, an actress and screenwriter with numerous theater credits.

Edith Frankie was born in the Transylvanian village of Chiesd in 1931. In 1944, after the Nazis invaded, her family was confined to a ghetto in a nearby city, and then sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Edith and her sister were subsequently sent to a labor camp in Riga, Latvia. They then were transferred to the Stutthof Concentration Camp in Poland and in the wake of the Soviet military advance, Edith and the other inmates were sent on a death march. After marching through Bergen-Belsen and Ravensbruck, they finally arrived at the Malchow Concentration Camp in Germany, where they were liberated in May 1945. Ultimately, Edith and her sister settled in Canada in 1947. In 1950, Edith married the late George Frankie, also a Survivor from Hungary. They had one son and moved to Los Angeles in 1961. For over twenty years, Edith has been very active in Holocaust education.

Paul Kester was born in 1925 in Wiesbaden, Germany. When he was seven years old, Hitler came to power, which changed the course of everyday life for him and his family. After Kristallnacht, his family arranged for him to leave Germany on a Kindertransport. Paul left Germany for Sweden in early 1939 and lived there for ten years. He settled in Los Angeles in 1949, where he worked in finance. He and his late wife Susanne have one son and two grandchildren.

Voices of History, one of the museum's signature programs, offers students the opportunity to create meaningful artistic reflections in various mediums. Students learn about the Holocaust through primary sources, informative sessions with museum staff, and dialogue with Holocaust survivors and create short films, theater performances, music compositions, and photography exhibits. The final projects capture the personal stories of the survivors, the students' understanding of this history, and their dedication to shaping the future of Holocaust education.

More information can be obtained at www.lamoth.org/news--events/events/voices-of-history and tickets can be purchased for $15 at www.thewallis.org/LAMOTH

Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust, the first survivor-founded Holocaust museum in the United States, is a primary source institution that commemorates those who perished, honors those who survived, and houses the precious artifacts that miraculously weathered the Holocaust. Since 1961 the museum has provided free Holocaust education to students and visitors from across Los Angeles, the United States and the world, fulfilling the mission of the founding Holocaust survivors to commemorate, educate and inspire. The museum is open seven days a week, and admission is always free. lamoth.org

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