The National Museum of Resistance and Human Rights (

French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...

: ''Musée National de la Résistance et des Droits Humains'') is located in the centre of

Esch-sur-Alzette Esch-sur-Alzette (; lb, Esch-Uelzecht ; german: Esch an der Alzette or ''Esch an der Alzig'') is the second city of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the country's second-most populous commune, with a population of 35,040 inhabitants, . It lies ...

in the south-east of

Luxembourg Luxembourg ( ; lb, Lëtzebuerg ; french: link=no, Luxembourg; german: link=no, Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, ; french: link=no, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg ; german: link=no, Großherzogtum Luxemburg is a small lan ...

. The specially designed building (1956) traces the history of Luxembourg from 1940 to 1945 under the Nazi oppression, through the reactions of the people (passive resistance, resistance movements, forced enrolment, strike, refractory, Luxembourger in the maquis and in the Allied forces), until liberation, by photos, objects and works of art. There is also an exhibition of the

Nazi concentration camps From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as concen ...

and the treatment of Luxembourg's Jews.

History

From the late 1940s, those involved in the resistance and political deportees began to plan a national resistance museum in order to preserve the memory of Luxembourg's victims of the

Nazi occupation German-occupied Europe refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly occupied and civil-occupied (including puppet governments) by the military forces and the government of Nazi Germany at various times between 1939 an ...

. A committee made up of the City of Esch-sur-Alzette, unions and representatives of

resistance movements A resistance movement is an organized effort by some portion of the civil population of a country to withstand the legally established government or an occupying power and to disrupt civil order and stability. It may seek to achieve its objectives ...

under the presidency of Ed Barbel, undertook a fund-raising exercise which led to the opening of the Resistance Museum on 22 July 1956. The building was designed by the architects Nicolas Schmit-Noesen and Laurent Schmit. In 1984, the Minister of Culture,

Robert Krieps Robert Krieps (15 October 1922 – 1 August 1990) was a Luxembourgish politician. He served as the President of the Luxembourg Socialist Workers' Party from 1980 until 1985, as well as serving in the Luxembourgish cabinet under both Gaston Thorn ...

, had the collection renewed and the museum renovated. The museum re-opened in 1987, and through ministerial authority was now dubbed a "National" museum. Since 2008 Frank Schroeder, a former art teacher, manages the museum.

The collection

The exhibition on the ground floor describes the fate of the Luxembourg people from the

German invasion German invasion may refer to: Pre-1900s * German invasion of Hungary (1063) World War I * German invasion of Belgium (1914) * German invasion of Luxembourg (1914) World War II * Invasion of Poland * German invasion of Belgium (1940) * G ...

on 10 May 1940, the beginning of the

Nazi regime Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

, until the liberation in September 1944 with the arrival of the Americans or in January 1945 after the

Battle of the Bulge The Battle of the Bulge, also known as the Ardennes Offensive, was the last major German offensive (military), offensive military campaign, campaign on the Western Front (World War II), Western Front during World War II. The battle lasted fr ...

. The first floor is devoted to artefacts from the concentration camps and the treatment of Luxembourg's Jews. Works of art include the reliefs by Emile Hulten and

Claus Cito Nicolas Joseph 'Claus' Cito (26 May 1882 – 10 October 1965) was a Luxembourgian sculptor educated at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels. He is most notable for having created the original Gëlle Fra war memorial, though his work ...

outside the museum to sculptures by

Lucien Wercollier Lucien Wercollier (26 July 1908 – 24 April 2002) was a sculptor from Luxembourg. While he worked primarily in bronze and marble, some of his work is sculpted in wood, alabaster, stone and onyx. His public monuments in bronze and marble are o ...

and René Weyland inside. The large fresco by

Foni Tissen Foni (Alphonse) Tissen (1909–1975) was a Luxembourg schoolteacher and artist who is remembered principally for his hyperrealistic, darkly humorous paintings, many of which were self-portraits. Early life and education Tissen was born on 3 June ...

and his canvas of the

Hinzert concentration camp Hinzert was a concentration camp in Nazi Germany, in what is now Rhineland-Palatinate, from the border with Luxembourg. Between 1939 and 1945, 13,600 political prisoners between the ages of 13 and 80 were imprisoned at Hinzert. Many were in tr ...

as well as Yvonne Useldinger's drawings of the Ravensbrück camp are also of note."Exposition permanente": Musée de la Résistance"
''Esch.lu''. Retrieved 20 February 2011.

Exhibitions

Since September 2009, temporary exhibitions have been displayed in the museum. Approximately every six months a new exhibition is shown: * ''Lebensbilder'', with oil paintings by , a former resistance member and political deportee, from 4 September 2009 to 3 October 2009. * ''Spott dem Naziregime - Karikaturen in Luxemburg vor, während und nach dem Krieg'', the first exhibition produced by the museum itself, from 4 June 2010 to 5 September 2010. * ''Témoins / Zeugen'', with photos by the Luxembourgish artist Tom Hermes, who portrayed contemporary witnesses, from 28 January 2011 to 1 May 2011. * ''Kunst/KZ - Art/camps'' with works by the artists Yvonne Useldinger, Lily Unden,

, and

, from 6 May 2011 to 16 October 2011. * ''Peuple européen, peuple étranger - Le Luxembourg et les Roms'', with photos by

Patrick Galbats Patrick Galbats (born 1978) is a freelance Luxembourg photographer and photojournalist who has completed a number of artistically presented reportages. Biography Galbats completed his schooling at the Lycée Technique des Arts et Métiers in Luxem ...

, from 10 February 2012 to 6 June 2012. * ''Between Shade and Darkness - Le sort des Juifs du Luxembourg de 1940 à 1945'', from 29 May to 24 November 2013. *''Nelson Mandela - From Prisoner to President'', from 29 April to 28 September 2014. *''Gestapo-Terror in Luxemburg'', from 17 October 2015 to 8 May 2016. *''Je me souviens'', from 15 October 2016 to 25 June 2017. *''Memento'', a presentation of Albert Kaiser's complete works from the homonymous series of 80 linocuts, from 13 January 2018 to 15 April 2018.

Bibliography

*Bernard Thomas, ''Bruchstellen - Chronik des Escher Resistenzmuseums'' ; in: ''forum'', Nr. 299 (September 2010), pp. 12–18. *Musée national de la Résistance, "Luxemburg im 2. Weltkrieg"

References

External links