Photograph Album of Kazet Theater Actors in Bergen-Belsen Displaced Persons Camp, 1945-1947

Photograph Album of Kazet Theater Actors in Bergen-Belsen Displaced Persons Camp, 1945-1947
Photo-album of the Kazet – Concentration Camp Theater. Bergen-Belsen [ca. 1945-1947].
Twenty one photographs in an album and two loose photographs, documenting the team of actors during performances and in the displaced persons camp. On the back of one photograph appear, in Yiddish, the details of the play, the director and the location – "vider farshpilt… fun Sami Feder… in Kazet theater – Bergen-Belsen". On the back of one photograph appear ink-stamps of the theater, ink-stamp of Sami Feder (from a later period) and the ink-stamp "Archives".
The album is bound in a fine leather binding, with a relief of flowers, a Talith and an open book with a legend on it: "Am Israel Hai", and a blue Star of David.
Total of 23 photographs, approx. 5X6 cm – 12.5X9 cm. Condition varies. Good overall condition. Minor blemishes.
Enclosed are a number of items from the estate of Sami Feder, founder of the theater (Yiddish): • A typewritten list of 52 names of theater members in Bergen-Belsen. • "Yidn in Daytchn Teater un Film far Hitler's Kumn tsu der Makht" [Jews in German theater and cinema prior to Hitler's rise to power], draft of an essay by Sami Feder. Mimeographed; corrections with correction fluid and penned notes. 7 pp. • A sketch for the cover of Sami Feder's book "Clenched Fists" (published by R. Mass, Jerusalem, 1979). • And more.
The Bergen-Belsen Displaced Persons Camp led an active political and cultural life, with many active organizations and institutions, including the Kazet Theater. The theater was founded in 1945 by actor and director Sami Feder. In the course of two years the theater's actors staged performances and plays in Yiddish for the Jewish public in the Displaced Persons camps in Germany. In 1947 they also performed in Belgium, Sweden, England and Paris. When many of the theater actors chose to remain in Paris, the theater’s activities ceased.
Provenance: Rimon Family Collection.