Anne Frank 80 Years A Memorial Tour in Current Images: Frankfurt am Main, Aachen, Amsterdam, Camp Westerbork, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Bergen-Belsen (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781505408744)

WWW.RWJ-PUBLISHING.COM R.W. Jansen, Author/Photographer, The Netherlands I visited The Annex (Amsterdam, Prinsengracht 263) for the first time in 2001. The Annex creates a deep impression on many people, and I was no exception: I could feel the tensions of the persons in hiding, and I realised that Anne had become caught in the Nazis web; she had been torn away from her everyday world. Her life was broken before it could blossem. Anne was interested in culture, religion and science, and had a keen interest in society at large, being very concerned about everybody's experienced ups and downs - and that was why I thought it was so dismal that she had been killed. And, sadly, this was for one reason only: because she was a jew. The need in me arose to portray the life of Anne Frank. Not by means of a biography or a book with old pictures, many of which have been published already before. Instead, I wanted to discover whether there are still remnants of her past life and surroundings in the present. In 2008-2011 I made a photoreport about the residences of Anne Frank (1929-1945). I visited her home addresses in Frankfurt am Main, Aachen, the Merwede Square in Amsterdam, her place of hiding - the Annex in Amsterdam - and the concentration camps of Westerbork -Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen - where she was kept imprisoned. I hope that my picture book inspires the reader and watcher to delve deeper into the history of the Holocaust and Anne Frank, and that it contributes to the mutual tolerance and understanding between people and cultures. I also hope that my picture book contributes to the maintenance of the cultural heritage that still reminds us of Anne Frank.