In 2016, Belarusian theater Kryly Khalopa began the project Brest Stories Guide – a series of documentary audio performances in the city space.
The performance is focused on antisemitism and the destruction of Brest Jewish community in 1941–1942. Before the outbreak of the war, there lived approximately 24 000 Jews in Brest (about 45% of the city population). Almost all of these people were annihilated.
The mobile application consists of the audio play and a city map which allow the user to navigate freely on the map with key places of Jewish heritage and dramatic events. Streets and yards become a stage for voices from the past. An audioplay is based on materials from the archives, books, photos, interviews with witnesses of the tragic events. In addition to the memories of surviving Jews and Brest citizens, were also used the reports of German officers and soldiers who were the participants of Ghetto`s destruction. The play becomes a kind of investigation with the hearing of witnesses in the case of antisemitism and the Holocaust in Brest in the 1930s and 1940s.
Brest Stories Guide is a project at the intersection of art, tourism and cultural heritage preservation, the result of the co-work of about twenty people, including historians, the experts from Jewish organization and the best actors of Brest theaters.
Brest Stories Guide was awarded as the best cultural project aimed at the preservation of cultural heritage in Belarus, contest of ICOMOS, 2019
Web-page: www.breststories.com