Working group

"Une idée fait son chemin" – An idea is paving its way. In early 2007 the Erfurt Working Group, a joint initiative of the German-Israeli Society and the Protestant Adult Education Foundation of Thuringia, asked for proposals for memorial signage for the deported and murdered Erfurt citizens. The initiative attached importance to:

• aesthetically appropriate objects of commemoration
• an innovative interpretation of monuments and remembrance in the urban environment
• an Erfurt-specific installation

These considerations echo the thinking behind “Stolpersteine” (“stumbling stones”) by Gunter Demnig, which was already established nationwide in Germany and beyond.

A (sometimes) stony path! Names, places, fates
Stand still and contemplate.

It is time to create citywide places of commemoration for the Erfurt citizens deported and murdered in the Shoa.

1. Names

All names should be stated at a central place of commemoration and remembrance.

2. Places

Places of humiliation, suffering, violence and deportation are recorded.

3. Fates

Individual histories should be retrieved from the anonymity of the national socialist mass murder of the Jews.

• Objects of commemoration are in immediate proximity to the homes or workplaces of persons concerned.
• We see the people remembered as individuals.
• As victims of ostracism, prosecution, terror and mass murder their personal fate also represents the ordeals of many unknown victims.