Ateliers Monnaie PUSH

Ateliers Monnaie PUSH
Kids enter the Brussels’ Ateliers La Monnaie / De Munt last year March 14 , 2019 , for the Belgian premiere of the community opera PUSH – a community project – based on the story of Simon Gronowski , holocaust survivor and a Brussels resident. The Belgian queen Mathilde was attended by Simon Gronowski and family. After the show , just before all had left, Amos Suchecki (from the chorus Choeurs d’enfants de la Monnaie) sings me this song a cappella in the hallway – here in the background of this video clip.

April 19th 2020 – Ma Vie N’est Que Miracles –
Tomorrow, April 19th 2020, a special virtual performance of the finale of PUSH – “Ma Vie N’est Que Miracles” – will premiere Online hosted by Howard Moody, Composer – with more than 150 singers from the UK and Belgium (Bexhill, Brussels, Chichester and Salisbury) – exactly 77 years after Simon Gronowski was helped by his mother Chana to jump from the 20th train to Auschwitz after three Resistance heroes stopped this Nazi train transporting 1600 Jewish deportees.
Film : Ateliers Monnaie PUSH (20200418) Michel van der Burg | michelvanderburg.com | miracles.media

Brussels Liberated

Brussels Liberated
From : The Year 1944 United Newsreel ( 208 UN 1034 USHMM RG-60.3053 | Film ID: 2396 ) courtesy of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum / National Archives and Records Administration . Filmed Sep. 3, 1944 in Brussels (Producer: United News Company). BUM20200415_29_19440903 .
Film : Brussels Liberated (20200415) Michel van der Burg | michelvanderburg.com | miracles.media.

Eating Tulip Bulbs ~ Hunger Winter Holland 1944-1945 | 20200325

Eating Tulip Bulbs ~ Hunger Winter Holland 1944-1945 .
(silent film)
My mother did not tell me much and no details on her experiences in World War 2, except for the Hongerwinter (“Hunger winter”) – the Dutch famine of 1944–45 – that she had to eat tulip bulbs.

As children in the 1950s our mother always told us to finish and clean our plates (and pretty large portions, served by our parents) , before being allowed to leave the table. The one thing we were regularly reminded of was the famine my mother and others had experienced…and that she even had to eat tulip bulbs – then a 16-year old teenager living (with her parents) in the city of The Hague during the Dutch famine of 1944–45.
The famine was caused by a German blockade plus the harsh winter blocking alternative water routes, that cut off food and fuel shipments to the western Netherlands were food stocks rapidly ran out in the large cities of The Hague, Rotterdam, and Amsterdam . Tulip bulbs and sugar beets were commonly consumed. Trees in The Hague city woods (like Scheveningse Bosjes shown in the film) were cut , and in the end furniture and houses were dismantled to provide fuel for heating.
When the famine was worst and deaths were reaching a peak , the Bezuidenhout neighbourhood of The Hague – were my mothers family lived – was bombed by British bomber crews with the wrong coordinates flying in fog and clouds, causing widespread death and destruction. More on that ‘Bombing of the Bezuidenhout’ later this month.

Menno Huizinga (1907–1947) took photographs illegally during the occupation , mainly in his hometown The Hague in Holland. He was a member of the group of Dutch photographers ‘De Ondergedoken Camera’ (1943-1945) – The Underground Camera – doing resistance work during the Second World War.

‘Eating Tulip Bulbs ~ Hunger Winter Holland 1944-1945’ is a silent film by Michel van der Burg , using photographs captured during this ‘Hunger winter’ 1944-1945 by Menno Huizinga in Holland (mainly in The Hague) from the public domain collection of the NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies , curated by Dutch Network War Collections (NOB) for WO2 Open Data Depot via Wikimedia Commons.

JR: New York Show – Afghan Refugees Inside Out Belgium

JR: New York Show – Afghan Refugees Inside Out Belgium.
One minute impression of visiting JR: Chronicles in the Brooklyn Museum in New York, focusing on the video wall of Inside Out projects, screening our short film Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild. The film is a documentary of the March 2014 Inside Out project ‘Justice For Afghan Refugees In Belgium’.
Further documentation showing the film online here : Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition (20200205).
https://michelvanderburg.com/2020/02/05/beguinage-refugees-into-the-wild-jr_-chronicles-edition/

JR: Chronicles | Brooklyn Museum | October 4, 2019 – May 3, 2020

CREDITS

Film Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild – Afghan refugees living in the Brussels Béguinage church with posters by Chiara Ravano for the Inside Out project “Justice for Afghan refugees in Belgium” – Olivier Bonny, Salon Mommen, Brussels, Belgium, March 2014. Félix Snyers on the Béguinage church pipe organ. A Beguinage Project report by Kristen Cattell & Michel van der Burg. Film : Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition (20200205) Michel van der Burg | miracles.media

JR: Chronicles | INSIDE OUT | Brooklyn Museum | October 4, 2019 – May 3, 2020
Brooklyn Museum reportage made October 2019 by Kristen Cattell as part of our Beguinage Project Series.
Film : JR: New York Show – Afghan Refugees Inside Out Belgium (20200206) by Kristen Cattell & Michel van der Burg | miracles.media

Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition

Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition (20200205) .

Our short documentary film ‘Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild’ is currently screening in the Brooklyn Museum in New York at the special exhibition JR: Chronicles – a major show that surveys the complete body of work of the artist JR for the first time in North America.

Best of INSIDE OUT – Justice For Afghan Refugees In Belgium

One of JR’s major projects is the global participatory art project INSIDE OUT, and the film ‘Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild’ documents one of the Inside Out projects ‘Justice For Afghan Refugees In Belgium’ – that was chosen as one of the favorite Inside Out Group Actions.

Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition

When visiting the Brooklyn Museum in New York last year, it was exciting to see the JR: Chronicles and our film at the museum’s impressive video wall.
However we noted the original Vimeo film version (20160620) was screening at the museum’s video wall, not the special edition we had prepared (with title and endscreen credit updates). A minor mistake but also an opportunity now to offer this new film edition that is posted today (20200205) – with a final update in the endscreen (credits) – called : Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition.

This new edition was archived today in JR’s project INSIDE OUT, and is forwarded to the Brooklyn Museum to hopefully soon allow replacing the current version – running for another three months…untill May 3, 2020 .

JR: Chronicles | Brooklyn Museum | October 4, 2019 – May 3, 2020

Link – Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ① MEMO 20160620 (1st edition) https://michelvanderburg.com/2016/06/20/beguinage-refugees-into-the-wild/

Film Credits
BÉGUINAGE REFUGEES INTO THE WILD
Afghan refugees living in the Brussels Béguinage church with posters by Chiara Ravano for the Inside Out project “Justice for Afghan refugees in Belgium” – Olivier Bonny, Salon Mommen, Brussels, Belgium, March 2014. Félix Snyers on the Béguinage church pipe organ. A Beguinage Project report by Kristen Cattell & Michel van der Burg.
Film : Béguinage Refugees Into The Wild ~ JR: Chronicles Edition (20200205) Michel van der Burg | miracles.media

Ashes Pond | 20200127

Ashes Pond
An unforgettable moment for me that ‘touching the ash pond’ I filmed in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp, were I was filming Simon Gronowski and Koenraad Tinel, May 2012, for the upcoming documentary film Miracles.
Into this pond were dumped the ashes of the people, who were murdered (gassed) and burned at the nearby crematorium.
Sharing this moment today for International Holocaust Remembrance Day 2020 to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz camps. Courtesy of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim, Poland. Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau Camp in Poland, May 24th 2012.
Film : Ashes Pond (20200127) Michel van der Burg | Settela•Com

Updates

20220604 – changes credit line

Embrace ~ Google Maps

Embrace ~ Google Maps
Google message ‘Your added place is making a difference’:
On the map 10,000 views today Jan. 21, 2020 at the ‘Embrace’ landmark I added the day before the inauguration of the work of art EMBRACE (October 26, 2018) by Koenraad Tinel – translation of his remarkable friendship with lawyer Simon Gronowski – at the foot of the Basilica Koekelberg in Ganshoren , Brussels , Belgium.
Watch the original panorama here – https://michelvanderburg.com/2018/10/26/embrace/
The place needed a more recent photo – that I added today ;)
Embrace – art by Koenraad Tinel in Ganshoren , Brussels , Belgium.
Film : 20200121 Michel van der Burg | 1-memo.com | miracles.media