HISTORY
About 60 members of the Oneg Shabbat group, led by Dr. Emanuel Ringelblum, risked their lives to document everything that was happening in the Warsaw Ghetto and the destruction of Polish Jewry.
They created the Underground Archive of the Warsaw Ghetto, also known as the Ringelblum Archive, which was inscribed in the UNESCO’s Memory of the World register. Without the Archive, our knowledge on the Holocaust would be significantly poorer. The Archive of over 35,000 pages of documents is not only a testimony of history, but also of great bravery.
Almost all members of the Oneg Shabbat group perished during the Holocaust. Most of them do not have a grave. Thanks to the efforts of the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland and the Jewish Community of Warsaw they will be honored. In April 2023, in the year of the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, at the Jewish Cemetery in Warsaw, we will unveil a symbolic tomb of the members of the Oneg Shabbat group. This commemoration was designed by Senna Kolektyw.
IDEA
The glass commemoration designed by Senna Kolektyw (Natalia Romik, Sebastian Kucharuk, Piotr Jakoweńko, Maciej Czeredys) pays homage to individual members of the Oneg Shabbat group. On the surface of the commemoration, built of glass bricks, there will be contemporary symbols referring to the professions performed by the Oneg Shabbat group. Despite the modern form, the engravings refer to tomb art and figurative motifs on tombstones.
The “invisible” monument, built of glass segments, directly refers to the words of Emanuel Ringelblum:
“The co-workers of Oneg Shabbat constituted, and still do, a homogeneous corporation animated by one spirit, filled with one idea. Oneg Shabbat is not an association of academics competing with and fighting each other, but a homogeneous corporation, a brotherly union, where everybody helps each other and has mutual goals (…).”
DONORS
The creation of the symbolic tomb was supported by the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, Tramiel family and donors of the Commemoration of the Ringelblum Archive.