Hans Maršálek Prize
Third Call for tender of the Hans Maršálek Award
The Mauthausen Committee Austria and the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen will endow the Hans Maršálek Award in 2021 in fulfilment of the legacy of the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen for outstanding achievements in the fields of commemoration, remembrance and awareness raising. The award is endowed with 4 prizes : 1. € 3.000,-; 2. € 2000.-; 3. € 1.000.-, special appreciation prize € 500.-. The deadline for submissions is 30 November 2020.
Extract from the preamble of the legacy: "As long as it is possible for us, we will fight to ensure that what happened to us will never happen again to another human being." The Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen (ÖLM) assigned this task to the Mauthausen Committee Austria (MKÖ) in the Austrian Parliament.
The Hans Maršálek-Award for outstanding achievements in the fields of commemoration, remembrance and awareness raising work was established in memory of Hans Maršálek on the occasion of his 100th birthday by the Mauthausen Committee Austria and the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen in 2014.
Hans Maršálek was arrested by the National Socialists for resistance activities in 1941 and deported to the Mauthausen concentration camp in autumn 1942, where he witnessed the crimes committed in Mauthausen. After World War II, he built up the Mauthausen archive and the museum of the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial. He is the author of numerous publications and was also director of the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial for a long time. Over the past decades, Hans Maršálek has provided whole generations of researchers and students with his extensive knowledge about the Mauthausen concentration camp memorial. He was very active until the very end in the educational work about the crimes of the National Socialists and for a long time he was chairman of the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen.
The objectives of the Hans Maršálek Award
Youth - Innovation - Civic Courage
The award is intended to commemorate Hans Maršálek and to support projects that work in his spirit. Projects worthy of an award are scientific works as well as initiatives for youth and adult education and initiatives that have been carried out to locally anchor the issues of National Socialism, concentration camps, (anti-)racism and strengthening democracy.
Conferring the award
The group of potential award winners is very broadly defined, taking into account the comprehensive claim that Hans Maršálek himself always maintained as a maxim. The application is open in principle, without any age limit; it is supranational and non-denominational and open to all political groups committed to the principles of democracy, human rights and social justice. In the spirit of Hans Maršálek, this award is not only aimed at Austrian applicants, but the founders expressly welcome all international applicants.
Application
The prize can only be awarded after a successful completion of the submitted projects: it is not project financing for planned projects. Previously submitted projects which have not been awarded a prize are eligible. Eligible persons and initiatives can submit their own projects for the award; a nomination can also be made by third parties.
The prize is awarded every three years and is endowed with € 6.500,-. The awards will be presented to the winners in 2021.
The deadline for applications for the third Hans Maršálek Award is 30 November 2020, and the prizes will then be awarded at a festive ceremony in spring 2021.
The following jury will take the decisions about the award winners
- Willi Mernyi, Chairman of Managing director Mauthausen Committee Austria (MKÖ)
- Christa Bauer, MAS, Managing director Mauthausen Committee Austria (MKÖ)
- Prof. Guy Dockendorf, Chair of Comité International de Mauthausen (CIM)
- Mag. Andreas Baumgartner, Secretary General of Comité International de Mauthausen (CIM)
- Univ.Prof. Dr. Peter Gstettner, Pedagogue
- Mag. Dr. Florian Wenninger, Historian
- MMag. Dr. Dr.Martin Krenn, LL.M. MA, Deputy Federal Chair KZ-Verband
- Claudia Prutscher, Vice-Chair Jewish Community Vienna
- Klaus Schöngruber, Representative Austrian National Youth Council (BJV)
- Mag. Martin Kranzl-Greinecker, media sector
Jury Chair: Helmut Edelmayr, Founding Member of Mauthausen Komitee Österreich and board member of Österreichische Lagergemeinschaft Mauthausen
For more information please contact Jury Chair Tel.: +43 / 664 / 330 31 36
Hans Maršálek Prize
Since 2014, the Mauthausen Committee Austria (MKÖ) and the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen (ÖLM) have been donating the Hans Maršálek Prize for outstanding achievements in the deliberately broad field of commemoration, remembrance and awareness work on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the association.
"Hans Maršálek was not only one of the last Austrian witnesses to the crimes of the Nazi regime committed against more than 200,000 people in the Mauthausen concentration camp. But he also convinced us with his commitment against right-wing extremism today. He remains a role model for all of us", said Willi Mernyi, Chairman of Mauthausen Committee Austria.
Dr. h.c. Hans Maršálek is still the outstanding person in the subject area of the Mauthausen concentration camp and its approximately 50 satelite camps. After organizing resistance in the concentration camp himself, he was commissioned in 1947 to plan the museum of the concentration camp memorial site. In the process, Hans Maršálek created an archive that is still the basis for numerous scientific works today. Hans Maršálek was also chairman of the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen and on the board of the Comité International de Mauthausen, and he took precautions for the time when the contemporary witnesses would retire by establishing contact with the youth organizations of the trade union and the Catholic Church. Their cooperation in the care of the places of former satelite camps and an ten year development process formed the Mauthausen Committee Austria, the successor organization of the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen.
The Mauthausen Komitee Österreich was founded on 15.12.1997 under the name Mauthausen Aktiv. In 2017 the Mauthausen Komitee Österreich celebrated the 20th anniversary of the association. To mark this occasion, the Austrian Camp Community Mauthausen and its successor organization, the Mauthausen Committee Austria, donated for the second time the Hans Maršálek Prize for outstanding achievements in the field of commemoration, remembrance and consciousness work.
"Hans Maršálek has dedicated his life to researching and documenting the history of the Mauthausen concentration camp and its satelite camps," emphasizes Dr. Irmgard Aschbauer, Chairwoman of the Austrian Camp Community, "and he never tired of warning about the dangers of nationalism, racism, exclusion and intolerance. This prize should be dedicated to his memory and his concerns".
The group of potential prize winners is very broadly defined in view of the comprehensive claim that Hans Maršálek himself always maintained as a maxim. Projects worthy of an award are scientific works as well as initiatives for youth and adult education and initiatives that have been carried out to anchor the topics of National Socialism, concentration camps, (anti-)racism, strengthening democracy locally. The prize can only be awarded after successful completion of the submitted projects and is not project financing for planned projects. In the spirit of Hans Maršálek, this prize is not only aimed at Austrian applicants, but the founders expressly welcome any international context.
The decision on the awarding of the prize is made by a nine-member jury. Eligible persons and initiatives can submit their own entries for the prize, or nominations can be made by third parties.