At the Shoah Museum Foundation,
a new logo nurtures Memory

A space divided in two. To enter and leave “restored, full of the desire to testify in life what you know and that must never happen again”. It is the theme of the artwork chosen among the many proposals for a new logo for the Shoah Museum Foundation in Rome dedicated to educational projects. A lively ideas contest which involved arts, technical, and trade high schools from all over Italy in the sign of a collaboration between the Foundation and the Ministry of Education.
The winning idea was Adrian Ungurianu’s, student at G. Cabot High School in Chiavari (Genoa). According to the commission, his logo was the most effective among the 140 artworks received.
“We are very pleased”, states President of the Foundation Mario Venezia. “Our purpose has always been for young people to get concretely involved. This is a wide-ranging cultural operation, made of different projects and commitments. The idea is for the initiatives we suggest to lead to tangible outcomes. Let the facts speak for themselves”.
Among these initiatives, one of the most successful is “AlternanzaScuola/Lavoro” (Work Placement), a feather in the cap for the Foundation, developed for years in the presence and now temporarily converted to smart working. Furthermore, thousands of students are involved in the many online activities suggested during this year of pandemic.
These principles imbue a forthcoming new project as well: “Future roots”. A formation program for 14 young people from age 18 to 25 to make them able museum guides for the visitors of Casina dei Vallati and its expository spaces, as Venezia tells. New “voices of the Memory”, he explains. A project bringing together different realities – City Hall, Jewish school, Ugei, Pitigliani – but also boys and girls who made themselves available on their own.
“I have always considered essential for the Memory to be translated in always new languages and proposals” states Paolo Masini, vicepresident of the Foundation, responsible for the new logo initiative. “This contest gave us demonstration of how important it is to modernise it, nourish it, preserve it thoroughly. A commitment which needs even greater involvement of young people, an ideal passing of the torch between generations”. The students’ artworks were judged by a qualified jury, which included, among others, illustrators Mauro Biani and Cinzia Leone.

Translated by Silvia Bozzo and revised by Antonella Losavio, students at the Advanced School for Interpreters and Translators of Trieste University, interns at the newspaper office of the Union of the Italian Jewish Communities.