This year, the Cultural Centre of Novi Sad once again organised series of cultural-artistic programmes and educational workshops that commemorate the victims of tragic events during Novi Sad Raid. In this way, our institution contributes to preservation of memory and raising public awareness on the importance of proper and expert education of youth. On the other hand, the Cultural Centre, in accordance with its primary activities, is dedicated on exploring relations between art and plight, focusing on tragic events during Novi Sad Raid and Holocaust.

  The crime that happened in Novi Sad between 21 and 23 January 1942 left an indelible mark in memory of this city and its inhabitants. Although horrific, or maybe precisely because it is horrific, this mark should not be washed away by tides of time. The goal of this project was to ask questions, but also provide some answers. Are we the generation in life of this city that will give in to silence? Or will we listen to echoes of the past in order to better cope with the present?

  This year, our institution organised seven-day programme entitled ‘Freezing Silence Speaks’. The programme started on 21 January, on the day when Novi Sad Raid begun and it ended on 27 January, on the international Holocaust Memorial Day. During this period, the Cultural Centre of Novi Sad organised seven workshops, film cycle entitled ‘Never to be repeated’ and three exhibitions.

  All programmes that the Cultural Centre presented to the citizens of this (and not only this) city, were invitation for a dialogue. If we can talk and through this talk learn about each other, if we let voices of times past reach us and if we listen to them, we believe that we will become better people. History of Novi Sad, unfortunately, offers a lot of material to connect these dates. Serbs, Jews, Roma, Slovaks, Hungarians, Romanians, Ruthenians, Germans, there are no nation that was not hurt by the World War II. Luckily, there is significant number of people who showed how to measure a human being in times that posed the hardest questions to people of this (and not just this) city. We believe that freezing silence must seize to be silence. Dialogue, something that characterises a human, should be strived for. By talking about the past in this way, we can take the responsibility for the most important issues – issues of our present.