Claude Lanzmann. The Recordings.
Exhibition at the Jewish Museum Berlin

When Claude Lanzmann, the French journalist and documentary filmmaker, premiered "Shoah" in Paris in April 1985, it marked a turning point in how the Holocaust was perceived. It was the first collection of eyewitness testimonies. During the 1970s and 1980s, Lanzmann and his collaborators Corinna Coulmas and Irena Steinfeldt-Levy had conducted extensive interviews with survivors, perpetrators, and other witnesses. For Lanzmann, this work was a lifelong commitment.

To mark what would have been his 100^th birthday, the Jewish Museum Berlin is showing the exhibition "Claude Lanzmann. The Recordings" from November 28, 2025. The exhibition opened on November 27, with a ceremonial evening event featuring speeches by Hetty Berg (Director of the Jewish Museum Berlin), Johann Wadephul (Federal Foreign Minister), François Delattre (French Ambassador to Germany), Lena Altman (Co-CEO of the Alfred Landecker Foundation), Dominique Lanzmann (Chair of the Claude and Felix Lanzmann Association (A.C.F.L.)), and Tamar Lewinsky (curator of the exhibition). For the first time, the filmmaker’s extensive audio archive is made public: around 220 hours of previously unreleased recordings from the years of research leading up to Shoah. Visitors will be able to explore the origins of the film until 12 April 2026. The exhibition will also be on view at the New York Historical from November 28, 2025 to March 29, 2026 and at the Mémorial de la Shoah in Paris from December 10, 2025 to March 29, 2026.

Lena Altman, co-CEO of the Alfred Landecker Foundation, notes: “The Lanzmann Audio Archive preserves uniquely powerful testimonies of the twentieth century – voices of Holocaust survivors as well as those of perpetrators. It demonstrates the profound work that remembrance can accomplish when it makes the horror tangible through the voices of those who endured it, witnessed it, or indeed caused it. At a time when the last eyewitnesses are falling silent and antisemitism is once again on the rise, the archive ensures access to these voices and keeps their stories alive in the consciousness of generations to come.” You can read the whole speech here.

“It is of great importance to me to support this significant project. Considering the shameful rise in antisemitism and that we are losing the last of those who can bear witness, we are all called upon to strengthen the memory of the Shoah and to create spaces where history can be experienced and reflected upon. By promoting the educational work on Claude Lanzmann’s audio archive, we at the Federal Foreign Office want to contribute to the preservation and further development of our culture of remembrance,” says Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul.

Making History Audible

Through selected original recordings, visitors can follow the research journeys of Lanzmann and his team. The exhibition reveals how people in the 1970s remembered the Holocaust - and how they tried to make sense of what they had experienced and endured. Six thematic listening areas guide visitors through key topics, including Lanzmann’s approaches and experiences as an interviewer; his first visit to the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial; how perpetrators reflected - or failed to reflect - on their crimes as well as the Holocaust in Lithuania.

Visitors are invited to move freely through the exhibition space wearing headphones, following translations of the multilingual conversations on monitors. Original documents from Lanzmann’s private archive, a video interview with his collaborators, and additional materials and film excerpts help contextualise the recordings.

• Exhibition dates: November 28, 2025 – April 12, 2026
• Venue: Eric F. Ross Gallery, Jewish Museum Berlin
• Admission: Free of charge
• Opening hours: Daily from 10 am to 6 pm

For more information about the exhibition, visit the website of Jewish Museum Berlin.

The Claude Lanzmann Audio Archive

In 2021 and 2022, the Jewish Museum Berlin received a total of 152 magnetic tapes from the Association Claude et Félix Lanzmann (A.C.F.L.), represented by Dominique Lanzmann, the filmmaker’s widow. Alongside interviews with survivors and perpetrators, the recordings also include conversations with writers, resistance fighters, clergy, intellectuals, politicians, German businesspeople, and historians. In 2023, the archive - together with the film Shoah - was inscribed in the UNESCO Memory of the World Register.

Following the donation, the museum began digitising the recordings in collaboration with the Selma Stern Centre for Jewish Studies Berlin-Brandenburg (SSZ) and the Digital interview collections of Freie Universität Berlin. The project is funded by the Alfred Landecker Foundation and the Federal Foreign Office.

More information about the Claude Lanzmann Audio Archive can be found here.