The Personal and the Present: A New Vision for Michigan’s Holocaust Museum

FAIN: GE-269698-20

Holocaust Memorial Center (Farmington Hills, MI 48334-3738)
Eli Mayerfeld (Project Director: August 2019 to present)

Planning for the reinterpretation and expansion of a permanent exhibition, related public programs, and curriculum materials exploring the history of the Holocaust. 

The Holocaust Memorial Center Zekelman Family Campus (HMC) requests a planning grant for reinventing its core permanent exhibition and related resources. Located in suburban Detroit, the HMC is one of the pre-eminent regional centers for Holocaust learning in the country, drawing visitors from across Michigan and the entire Midwest region. In order to keep pace with changing conditions and contemporary audiences, the HMC is planning a full update of its core permanent exhibit. This would be centered around personal stories, which will allow for a deeper contextual understanding of the Holocaust’s relationship to the past and the present. The HMC has already invested over $100,000 on a study outlining a potential vision for the exhibition. This grant would provide a report of scholarly recommendations and a formal evaluation plan for the re-imagining of the permanent core exhibit and related resources.