Exhibition Open Day – Weekend access and guided tour of Nazi Slave Labour

Our latest groundbreaking exhibition, explores the scale and brutality of the Nazis’ slave labour system through unique objects, photographs and documents from our archive.

Join us on 11 October for a weekend opening of our exhibition gallery, offering an exclusive chance to see this exhibition outside of our usual hours.

The curators of this exhibition will also be offering a guided tour of the display, including insights into their research and curatorial decisions, and even more information on highlights from our collection that are on display.

The exhibition will be open from 11am – 4pm. For visitors throughout the day there is no need to book in advance.

The guided tour will take place at 11:30am. To join the tour please book your free space using the link below. Please ensure to arrive shortly before it starts and gather in the exhibition gallery.

Between 1939 and 1945, 20 million individuals were exploited as slave and forced labourers by the Nazi regime. Thirteen million of them were concentration camp prisoners, POWs and foreign civilian workers within the Third Reich, and seven million were forced to work in occupied territories outside Germany as the Second World War was waged.

The slave labour system was a brutal one: two and a half million slave labourers died, predominantly Soviet prisoners of war and prisoners in SS concentration camps.

This exhibition draws on the unique collections of the Wiener Holocaust Library to explore how perpetrators such as the SS, the chemical company I.G. Farben and weapons manufacturer Krupp profited off and exploited slave labourers. It will also examine the stories of the many victims of slave labour: from the experiences of Jewish labourers in Auschwitz subcamps dying from chemical poisoning; to prisoners of war being starved to death while forced to build Nazi Atlantic defences in the Channel Islands.

Also on display for the first time will be contemporary photographs of survivors of Nazi slave labour by portrait and documentary photographer, Mike Stone. His images of individuals who were forced to work in Nazi and allied industries reveal lives shaped by their persecution.

Through clandestine photographs of forced labourers at work, eyewitness testimonies, and the official files of culpable companies, visitors will gain insight into the experiences of the victims, and trace how industries and companies became complicit in their exploitation.

Find out more about the exhibition here.