Portrait of the Month
László Kiss
In January 2014, Memory Project founders Roz Jacobs and Laurie Weisman traveled to Budapest, Hungary to launch The Memory Project exhibit and workshops at the Hungarian Jewish Archives. To make the workshop more meaningful to the participants there, 16 Hungarian subjects were added to the Memory Project photo archives. They were selected by our partners at the Archives and the Zachor Foundation for Social Remembrance and include Jewish, homosexual and Roma victims of the Holocaust. One of the subjects was László Kiss, who was born in Székesfehérvár, Hungary, about 40 miles outside of Budapest where the workshop was held.
Bringing the exhibit and workshop to Hungary felt especially significant because the Hungarian government has tried to suppress Holocaust history and the role it played. This program honored the stories of Jews in Hungary before and during the Holocaust, and also fostered an interest in modern Jewish culture. László’s family lived a happy and vibrant life in their home country before the Holocaust. By 1945, only László had survived. Read more about him below.
About the subject
László Kiss and his twin brother Bandi lived with their family in Seregélyes, Hungary. László and his brother were refused from their local high school for being Jewish, and went away for school. Shortly after they returned home, Jews were forced into slave labor and soon, the whole Jewish population was deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau for extermination. László and Bandi were sent to the twin camp to be experimented on by Joseph Mangele. They were forced to go on a death march and Bandi was killed trying to escape. László was the inly survivor in his family. Honor László by viewing more portraits of him.
About the workshop
This portrait was made at the Hungarian Jewish Archives in Budapest.