From 2 to 20 September 1995, Holocaust survivors from Bochum and Wattenscheid visited their former home communities. This visit was initiated by a civic-organised, non-profit association. The members campaigned for years for the invitation and finally overcame the city’s deep-seated resistance to inviting them. The Lord Mayor agreed to extend the invitation.
During the visit, the ZIMMERDENKMÄLER exhibition took place in houses in Bochum’s Blumenstraße, where residents opened up their flats for artistic works, symbolically giving the city’s former citizens a place to live again.
The collection comes from the co-founder and chairwoman of the association, Dr Irmtrud Wojak. It contains association documents, correspondence, the association’s newsletter as well as interviews with the survivors from Bochum and Wattenscheid and a collection of photos of the visit.
It also contains correspondence and interviews about the ZIMMERDENKMÄLER exhibition and documentation about the visit and the exhibition.
Cataloguing is carried out using a finding aid. Partial collections are digitised for users in the archive. The collection is accessible to the public with restrictions.
Duration: 1933-1995
Size: Approx. 0.5 m
