Role (Státního) židovského muzea v Praze při uchování paměti na šoa v období 1945–1989

The study analyzes the manner in which the State Jewish Museum in Prague maintained memory of the Shoah from 1945–1989 through exhibitions, publications and occasional speeches. It reflects upon the fact that the post-war interpretation of the Jewish fate during the Second Republic and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia had to take into account the socio-political atmosphere of that time. From 1945 to 1948, state authorities did not interfere in the activities of the museum, and therefore this leading institution of the Jewish minority was able to present the Shoah as an unprecedented tragedy of humanity (at the time, the museum primarily presented rescued works created by painters in Terezin). During the fifties, when the state was gripped by anti-Semitism, the prevailing narratives were that this was one of many genocides in human history and that the Jews who were murdered and perished were anti-imperialist warriors who supported socialism. At that time, propaganda also began to emphasize the importance of the Terezin Small Fortress at the expense of the ghetto itself. At the end of the fifties, drawings by children at Terezín were exhibited for the first time. These not only became a forceful reminder and documentation of the Jewish tragedy, but also an export product of the totalitarian state of that time. In the “Golden Sixties”, the interest of mainstream society in the Holocaust grew. That was also when Jewish representatives decided to promote their own commemoration through a memorial in the Pinkas Synagogue. The period of “normalization” with its anti-Israeli propaganda suppressed the Jewish tragedy. But the museum at least made the works of Terezín artists accessible again.