Conference International Conference: Holocaust against Sinti and Roma in Film
Press Release No. 120/2025
5 November 2025
Event “Visibilities of Memory” takes up stereotyped depictions and new perspectives in the visual culture of memory
The depiction of Sinti and Roma in the visual culture of memory of the Holocaust is the topic of an international conference taking place from 12 to 14 November 2025 at Heidelberg University. It centers around how stereotyped antigypsy images have continued to influence film as a medium, especially, and what new perspectives of film representation are opening up today, in particular in documentary films focusing on the fate of the third or fourth generation of survivors. The event entitled “Visibilities of Memory” is expected to attract around 50 participants from academia, film practice and educational activity. The conference features speakers from Europe and the United States and is organized by the Research Centre on Antigypsyism and the project “Critical Film & Image Hub” located there.
“For a long time, the history of Sinti and Roma was absent from Holocaust films. Where members of the minority were portrayed at all, the films frequently resorted to narrative patterns with traditional antigypsy image worlds,” underlines Dr Radmila Mladenova, director of the project “Critical Film & Image Hub”. From the 1980s onward, however, things gradually began to change against the background of the civil rights movement and recognition of the genocide against Sinti and Roma. This period saw the making of feature films that first emphasized the innocence and hopelessness of the victims and later centered around musicians, writers or athletes as protagonists. Dr Mladenova says that documentary films from the third or fourth generation of survivors are taking up the story anew and are self-confidently developing counter-images to antigypsy portrayals.
The conference “Visibilities of Memory. The Holocaust against Sinti and Roma in Film” comprises, besides introductory lectures, eight panels devoted to different focal themes. These include documentaries as archives of collective memory and also the intermingling of film, historical policy and culture of memory in different European countries. In other panels, participants will focus inter alia on ambivalent heroes in feature films on the Holocaust and artistic engagement with genocide in multimedia formats such as plays, exhibitions on museums or graphic novels. In two workshops representatives from film practice and academia will compare notes on current productions. In a final round of discussion, participants will give their responses on how films can contribute to contemporary Holocaust education. The three-day event is supported by the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung.
In the context of the project “Critical Film & Image Hub” researchers from different disciplines ask how images and films contribute to the emergence, transmission and spread of antigypsyism, analyzing the political and social significance of visual formats, as well as their aesthetic dimensions. The research project is receiving funding from the Federal Ministry for Education, Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth as part of the cooperation consortium against antigypsyism in the federal program “Live Democracy!”.
Anyone wishing to attend is requested to register in advance on the conference website – online attendance is also possible.
Note to newsrooms
The conference “Visibilities of Memory” is taking place in the International Academic Forum Heidelberg, Hauptstraße 242. Media representatives are warmly invited to attend and report. Please sign up with jonathan.mack-sroka@zegk.uni-heidelberg.de