Inside the Auschwitz I Visitor's
Center
Holocaust art displayed
inside Visitor's Center at Auschwitz in 1998
The only tourist entrance to the former
Auschwitz main concentration camp is through the Visitor's Center
in the red brick administration building, the same building where
prisoners were registered at the camp more than sixty years ago.
The inside of the building has been remodeled so that visitors
are routed through a hallway which takes them past cafe tables
and a small store, where one can purchase a guide book or film,
to an art exhibit area and the entrance to the movie theater.
The photo above, taken in 1998, shows
a sculpture on display near the exit door to the former camp;
when I visited again in 2005, the walls in this room were painted
white, as the photo below shows.
Same statue shown in
2005 photo
The green arrow on the wall in the photo
above points to the door to the outside, where visitors exit
from the Visitor's Center to begin their tour of the Auschwitz
main camp.
The pictures below show the hallway and
exhibit area in the Visitor's Center, taken in 1998. The first
photo below shows Polish students, who seemed to be well versed
in the history of Auschwitz, examining a map of the camp. The
large letter i over the door in the background indicates that
tourist information is available.
Entrance hallway at
Auschwitz I Visitor's Center in 1998
The photo below shows some of the Holocaust
artwork which lined the walls in the Visitor's Center in 1998,
including a photograph of a real heart (hopefully an animal heart)
with a Jewish yellow star pinned to it with a safety pin. When
I visited again in October 2005, this artwork was no longer there
and there were old black and white photos on the walls.
Artwork formerly on
display in 1998
A 15-minute movie, taken by the Soviet
Union in early February 1945, is shown every half hour in the
visitor's center. A movie ticket cost 3.50 zloty in 2005, although
there was no charge to enter the former concentration camp. The
English version of the film was shown at 11 a.m. Tour groups
already have their tickets in advance and do not have to wait
in line at the cashier's window.
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