The eminent Dutch-born sculptor and Holocaust survivor Maurice Blik talks to journalist and Maastricht University alumnus York Membery about being interned in the notorious WWII concentration camp, Bergen-Belsen. 

Born into a Jewish family in Amsterdam in 1939, both his grandmother and his baby sister died at Belsen, while his father was murdered at Auschwitz. They were among the more than 100,000 Dutch Jews to perish in the Holocaust. Blik, a past president of the Royal British Society of Sculptors, is the author of The Art of Survival, a memoir about his wartime experiences and his life as a sculptor.

With music of the Cassiopeia Collective, a group of women classical musicians focuses on exploring different group formations to enjoy the creative process and the research involved. In this concert, Isabel Rico (flute and piano) and Irina  Loskova (soprano) are bringing back the memories of those days with songs from Duparc, Richepin, etc.

This interview is organised on the occasion of Nationale dodenherdenking, Remembrance of the Dead. On this day, we commemorate all the civilians and members of the armed forces of the Kingdom of the Netherlands who died in the Second World War, as well as in wars or peacekeeping missions since WWII.