A film by Luigi Toscano
Black Sugar
Red Blood
the story of Anna
Black Sugar
Red Blood
the story of Anna
„This is the incredible story of Anna from Kyiv. Among other things, she survived the Auschwitz concentration camp as a small child. Despite many futile attempts, she has not learned anything about her origins to this day. Luigi Toscano has set out to find her traces.“
An unbelievable life story has not let go of German-Italian photographer and filmmaker Luigi Toscano since the beginning of his memory project „Lest we Forget“. It is the story of Anna Strishkowa, 81-year-old microbiologist from Kyiv, who survived the Auschwitz concentration camp as a small child and still does not have any traces to her roots. Luigi decides to help Anna find her true identity.
But shortly before the actual shooting of the movie starts war breaks out in the Ukraine and Anna finds herself facing war for the second time in her life. Despite ongoing missile attacks and constant alerts, she refuses to leave Kjiv, her hometown. At the same time, she refuses to give up the search. For Anna, this search is her last chance to discover her roots.
The starting point of the research is a grim place: Auschwitz – concentration camp, scene of planned mass murder and symbol of the crimes of National Socialism. This is where Anna‘s story of survival begins.
After liberation, she was taken to Kyiv and adopted by a Ukrainian family. A Soviet documentary film from 1945 shows Anna‘s tattoo number: 69929. Shortly thereafter, her adoptive parents had the number removed.
Anna tried in vain to find out something with this number. In the course of their research, Luigi and his team come across clues that cast doubt on the number‘s accuracy. Contrary to all expectations, they find information that points to Anna‘s true identity and even clues to possible siblings.
The documentary reveals how complex Anna‘s path from Auschwitz to Kyiv was – full of further concentration camps and insurmountable obstacles.
Filming locations
The filming takes place in Poland (Auschwitz, Potulice, Konstantynow), Israel (Jerusalem), Ukraine (Kyjiv, Lviv) and Germany.
94Min., 4k, Dolby digital
The film will be submitted to various international festivals in 2024-25. Following this, a theatrical release will be targeted. Subsequently, the film will be offered to TV stations and streaming services. In the education sector, Landeszentrale für politische Bildung will include the film in its education portal. In cooperation with the Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs of Baden-Württemberg and GdV e.V., the film will be presented at schools in Baden-Württemberg Germany and World Wide.
Luigi Toscano
The photographer and filmmaker Luigi Toscano is a late-comer with an eventful past. As a roofer, doorman and window cleaner, the son of Italian immigrant workers experienced his environment from the most diverse perspectives. It is unusual for this to develop into an artistic career. But for Luigi Toscano it was a necessity, because the many visions and stories in his head must be shared and told. With photography, Toscano is able to capture his view of things. In his early works, the self-taught photographer concentrated mainly on the observation and depiction of still scenes and objects. With growing self-confidence, however, photographing people became the focus of his work.
The photographer Luigi Toscano is guided by „respect“ and „humility“-two old-fashioned-sounding virtues that have long accompanied him as a human being. „Colorblind“ (2003) is Luigi Toscano‘s first exhibition. And with his series „72 Hours“, for which he roamed through Mannheim, New York, Shanghai and Tehran, among other places, he has established his role as a photographer. Even outside the exhibition rooms, his black-and-white images can be found in a wide variety of contexts – as CD covers, flyers and in the illustrated book „Backstage,“ which portrays the comedian Bülent Ceylan. Or on pizza boxes. With the Pizzart project, Luigi Toscano also brings his art to the people as a cardboard box and at the same time delivers the pizza from the self-built wood-fire-oven.While Luigi Toscano‘s love for deep and detailed photographs has continued to grow, a new passion has developed.Moving objects, which are increasingly coming into focus, demand a new form of expression in the form of filming. Since 2006, Luigi Toscano has therefore also been active as a filmmaker. This was followed by projects for various musicians, including Laith Al-Deen, and the award-winning image movie „Wir sind Mannheim. „Transmission“ is Toscano‘s first cinema film, which premiered in 2009.
2013 marks the ten year anniversary of his first exhibition „Colorblind“. Since 2014, Luigi Toscano has been portraying Holocaust survivors around the world for his project LEST WE FORGET. More than 500 of these encounters have already taken place in Germany, the USA, Austria, Ukraine, Russia, Israel, France, Poland and Belarus. 2021 Therefore, Luigi Toscano was appointed as UNESCO Artist for Peace in 2021. He became the first photographer worldwide to receive this honor. In September of the same year, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier awarded him with the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany. The documentary of the same name, LEST WE FORGET, premiered at the 2019 Seattle International Film Festival and was shown on all Alaska Airlines flights betweenJune and July 2019.
Contributors
Alexei Barinov
Fixer vor Ort: fand Olena Borukh (Tochter von Galina Iwanowa) in Drohobytsch
Andreas Stenger
Präsident LKA Baden Württemberg
Andrii Kohut
Leiter, SBU-Archiv
Anzhela Beljak
Koordinatorin, Aktion Sühnezeichen
Friedensdienste e.V. in der Ukraine und Moldau
Dr. Danuta Teresa Konieczny
Referentin für Mittelosteuropa, Stv.
Geschäftsführerin, Maximilian-Kolbe-Werk e.V.
Helena Kubica
Historikerin, ehem. Wissenschaftliche
Mitarbeiterin Auschwitz-
Birkenau State Museum
Holger Krämer
Deutsche Botschaft Warschau, nun
AA: Ref. 402 Wirtschaftsdiplomatie
Jens Waibel
Deutsche Botschaft Warschau
Kristine Shon
Dolmetscherin in Unna
Łukasz Lipiński
Press Office, Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
Masha Pollak-Rozenberg
Director, Archives Division
Fred Hillman Chair for Holocaust
Documentation, Yad Vashem
Nikita Fialkov
Fachgruppenleitung „Archiv und
Dokumentationsstelle“, DRK-Generalsekretariat
Oksana Yankovenko
Historikerin, Archiv-Leiterin des Nat.
Memorials “Ukraine im Zweiten Weltkrieg”
(bearbeitete Lytwynow-Archiv)
Oleksandr Bilous
Historiker, Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiterin des
Nat. Memorials “Ukraine im Zweiten Weltkrieg”
Oleksandr Pasternak
Historiker, Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin des
Nat. Memorials “Ukraine im Zweiten Weltkrieg”
Robert Kardach
Service of the reading room,
Archiwum Państwowe w Bydgoszczy
Sima Velkovich
Head of the Family Roots Research
Section, Reference and Information
Department, Yad Vashem
Svitlana Usenko
Journalistin, TV-Produzentin, Regisseurin
Szymon Kowalski
Director, Archive, Auschwitz-
Birkenau State Museum
Tetiana Litvinchuk
Journalistin
Tetiana Pastushenko
Historikerin
Tetyana Firman
Dolmetscherin in Drohobytsch
Thoralf Cleven
Redakteur RND
Tomasz Pasieka
Director, Muzeum Ziemi Krajeńskiej
w Nakle nad Notecią
Valentyna Smirnova
Historikerin, Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin
des Nat. Memorials “Ukraine im Zweiten
Weltkrieg” (bearbeitete Lytwynow-Archiv)
Valerii Vasyliev
Historiker
Valerio Trabandt
Deutsche Botschaft Warschau
Yaroslava Pasichko
Historikerin, Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin des
Nat. Memorials “Ukraine im Zweiten Weltkrieg”
Organizations and institutions
Archiv des Staatlichen Museums
Auschwitz-Birkenau
Archiv des Staatlichen
Sicherheitsdienstes der Ukraine
Archiv des Waisenhauses Nr. 13
Archive Division, Yad Vashem
Arolsen Archives, International
Center on Nazi Persecution
Daniela Weiss Bild Forensic/
Cybercrime LKA
Deutsche Botschaft Warschau
Deutsches Rotes Kreuz
Institut für Nationales
Gedenken in Bydgoszcz
Institut für Nationales
Gedenken in Warschau
Kleines Museum in Potulice
Martin Boll Polizei Mannheim Matthias
Bölle LKA Baden Würtemberg
Muzeum Ziemi Krajeńskiej
w Nakle nad Notecią
Nationales Museum Ukraine
im Zweiten Weltkrieg
Pschenytschny Staatliches Zentralarchiv
für Kino, Photo, Phono der Ukraine
Staatliches Archiv in Bydgoszcz /
Archiwum Państwowe w Bydgoszczy
State Archive in Lodz
Staatliches Archiv der Kyjiw Oblast
Staatliches Archiv der Stadt Kyjiw
Stadt Mannheim
The Oleksandr Dovzhenko National
Center (Dovzhenko Center)
Ukrainisches Rotes Kreuz
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
ZDF Mediathek
Zentralarchiv der Oberen
Machtorgane der Ukraine
Crew
Writer, director
Luigi Toscano
Camera
Paul Götz
Nicolas Mussell
Camera Ukraine
Oleksandr Zhuravsky
Denys Krasylnikov
Sound
Yannick Bruch
Paul Götz
Sound Ukraine
Sergiy Melnychuk
Light
Paul Götz
Nicolas Mussell
Yannick Bruch
Light Ukraine
Oleksandr Zhuravsky
Denys Krasylnikov
Sergiy Melnychuk
Cut
Paul Götz, Luigi Toscano
Color Correction
Paul Götz
Illustrations
Mehrdad Zaheri
Animation
Paul Götz
Music
Mathias Kiefer
Andreas Viehöver
Sound mixing
Sevenarts-Studios
Production assistance
Max Martin
Text design
Silvia Fleck
Global organization
Katja Iesikowa
Historian
Artyom Ieromenko
Poem Black Sugar Red Blood
Olga Gelevan, geb. Stryzhkova
Interpreter, Nakło nad Notecią, Poland
Malgorzata Lusiak
Interpreter, Drohobytsch, Oblast Lwiw, Ukraine
Tetyana Firman
Interpreter, Unna, Germany
Kristine Shon
Speaker, poem
Johanna Withalm
Speech coach, Voice Over
Barbara Zechel
Transl, UKR-GER
Alina Kuchma
Transl, POL-GER
Agnieszka Birsak
Transl & Subtitles
Yannick Bruch
Press
Karolina Jarecki
Consulting
Linda Rodriguez
Graphics
Stefanie Lehmann
Fixer on site: found Olena Borukh (daughter of Galina Ivanova) in Drohobych
Alexei Barinov