The 2020 Victorian Museums and Galleries Awards online presentation was held on Tuesday 8 December by AMaGA Victoria, the peak body for 1,000+ museums and collecting organisations. The night was hosted by Cal Wilson, Melbourne comedian and author, including a special address by Danny Pearson MP, Minister for Creative Industries.
The Melbourne Holocaust Museum has received The AMaGA Victoria Award for Medium Museums/Galleries (8-50 Paid Staff) for their Ask a Survivor project.
Ask a Survivor was developed with the Melbourne Holocaust Museum’s community of Holocaust Survivors. Over an 8-year period, 46 interviews with 32 different survivors were conducted. Meeting and interacting with a Holocaust survivor is one of the unforgettable highlights of visiting the Melbourne Holocaust Museum. Ask a Survivor was created to future-proof this experience and to ensure that the museum could facilitate ongoing meaningful interaction between students and Holocaust survivors. With COVID-19 restrictions, the Melbourne Holocaust Museum had to fast track this project and continue to educate students through online workshops.
In this interactive experience, 18 questions most asked by students were curated as an online resource. Students then have an opportunity to pose these questions, compare responses and see the similarities and differences in the survivors’ answers.
JUDGES’ COMMENTS
The judges found the Melbourne Holocaust Museum Ask a Survivor website project “A moving and a significant project that was delivered respectfully and with integrity.” They acknowledged the importance of capturing survivor testimony in future-proofing these narratives for generations to come and were impressed with the good use of technology, high level of execution and ease of navigation of the website.
