Nina Franoszek Press Reviews - Villa Aurora Foundation for European - American Relations
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Nina Franoszek Press Reviews - Villa Aurora Foundation for European - American Relations Villa Aurora Foundation for European American Relations Phone: 310-454-4231 520 Paseo Miramar Fax: 310-573-3601 Pacific Palisades, CA 90272 USA www.villa-aurora.org Shahid Nadeem and the actors of his theater play “Acquittal”. Nina Franoszek, Stephanie Parker, Danna Hansen, Judith Scott. www.ninafranoszek.com 1 Nina Franoszek Press Reviews - Villa Aurora Foundation for European - American Relations The Villa Aurora Foundation is dedicated to freedom of expression and creativity and brings European artists and intellectuals to Los Angeles, to work and interact with interested communities within Southern California. Since 1995, the Villa has been home to nearly one hundred visual artists, composers, filmmakers, and writers who are chosen by peer review to pursue their own projects for a period of three months. Every year the villa, in cooperation with PEN, also awards the Feuchtwanger Fellowship for up to twelve month to a writer who is being persecuted or forced to love in exile. We offer a wide range of public lectures, debates, panel discussions, symposia, film screenings, concerts and performances. The villa’s web site, located at www.villa-aurora.org , provides extensive information about current and upcoming events. History of Villa Aurora "A veritable castle by the sea" is what German author Thomas Mann once called Villa Aurora, the former home of Mann's fellow countryman and writer Lion Feuchtwanger and his wife Marta. The Villa was built in 1927 by the Los Angeles Times as a demonstration home on the picturesque hills of Pacific Palisades. Lion and Marta Feuchtwanger purchased the home in 1943, after having fled their first exile in the South of France. During the following years and until the early 1950s, Villa Aurora was the preferred meeting place for German and European exiles in Los Angeles, making it a unique crossroad of European and American culture in the twentieth century. Thomas and Heinrich Mann, Bertolt Brecht, Alfred Döblin, Franz Werfel, Aldous Huxley, Ludwig Marcuse, Kurt Weill, Hanns Eisler, Arnold Schoenberg, Bruno Frank, Fritz Lang, and Charlie Chaplin, were regular guests at Villa Aurora. They and their hosts would gather for readings and musical evenings, celebrations and discussions. After Mr. Feuchtwanger's death, his widow Marta kept his memory and spiritual inheritance alive. When Marta Feuchtwanger passed away in 1987, German journalist and Feuchtwanger biographer, Volker Skierka, organized an initiative to save Villa Aurora from sale into private hands. He had been warned by his American friend and executor of the Feuchtwanger estate, Professor Harold von Hofe, that the Villa Aurora might be sold by the University. Michael Naumann, publisher of German Rowohlt Verlag at the time, journalist Fritz J. Raddatz, and member of the German Parliament, Freimut Duve, were supporters from the very beginning. They were joined in their efforts by numerous public officials and the media in Germany and Los Angeles. The Tagesspiegel Foundation in Berlin took up the cause as well. In 1988 both initiatives merged into Friends of Villa Aurora, Inc. In Los Angeles, the Foundation for European-American Relations came into being, with its Advisory Board, composed of representatives from the arts and letters as well as academic and cultural organizations. With the financial help of the Berlin Lottery Foundation and the German Foreign Office, the Friends of Villa Aurora under the chairmanship of attorney Lothar Poll and later, journalist Marianne Heuwagen-were able to purchase the house from USC in 1990. After extensive renovation under the direction of architect Frank Dimster, the Villa has been restored to its original splendor and has achieved historical landmark status. In 1996 the City of Los Angeles bestowed its Historic Preservation Award of Excellence on the Villa and Mr. Dimster. Twenty-two thousand volumes from Lion Feuchtwanger's extensive personal library are still housed in the Villa; an additional eight thousand books from his library comprise USC's Lion Feuchtwanger Memorial Library. Since 1995 Villa Aurora has been an international meeting place for artists. www.ninafranoszek.com 2 Nina Franoszek Press Reviews - Villa Aurora Foundation for European - American Relations The Villa Aura stands as a monument in remembrance of the past, as well as a space dedicated to contemporary issues of human rights, international cooperation and creative expression. Internationally known German authors Berthold Brecht, Thomas Mann, Franz Werfel, Lion Feuchtwanger, Bruno Frank, Alfred Neumann, Friedrich Torberg, Leonhard Frank, Alfred Döblin, fellow German émigre´s Ernst Gottlieb and Felix Guggenheim all found exile in Los Angeles during World War II. and while there, they participated in a remarkable literary endeavor, that gave testimony to the eminent cultural force that was expelled by Hitler and which found a future in America. As these writers-in exile, Charly Chaplin and many others gathered at the Villa in the early 1940s in the past seven years more than 80 European artists and six writers from Africa and Asia have continued the tradition of living and creating at this house, and engaging with the citizens of Los Angeles. Villa Aurora has become a place where people connect with others to form an artistic and intellectual community. Thousands of guests have met the residents an have attended the public events. The villa has enriched the cultural life of Los Angeles and become an energetic part of it. In spite of the fact that the Villa itself can only accommodate small gatherings, it is through partnership with the finest arts and cultural institutions in Southern California, that Villa Aurora has touched the lives of so many Angelenos. © Volker Corell PARTNERS – PROGRAM CO SPONSORS California Institue of the Arts /School of Music, Department of Germanic Languages at UCLA, Department of Musicology at UCLA, Export Union of the German Cinema, Feuchtwanger Memorial Library at USC, Getty Research Institute, Goethe Institut Inter Nationes Los Angeles, Green Integer / Sun and Moon Press, PEN Center USA West / Freedom- to Write Program, 18th Street Arts Complex Santa Monica, ACE Gallery Los Angeles, American Academy Berlin, American Council on Germany, American Jewish Committee, Arno Schmidt Foundation, Atlantik- Brücke Foundation, Axel Springer Verlag, Consulate General of Austria in Los Angeles, Consulate General of France in Los Angeles, Consulate General of Sweden in Los Angeles, Consulate General of Germany in Los Angeles, DAAD Art Programm Berlin, Directors guild of America, Ernst Toch Society, European Film Academy, FFA (Federal Film Board), Foundation Mittelsten Scheid, Friedrich Ebert Foundation, German American Cultural Society, Heinrich Boell Foundation, Highways Performance Space, Institut Francais Berlin, Institute for the Humanities at USC, Ivri-NASAWI,Japanese American Cultural & Community Center, Knitting Factory, Konrad Adenauer Foundation, KunstSalon Köln, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra, Los Angeles Public Library, MAK Center / Schindler House, Max Kade Institute, MOCA Contemporaries, Motion Picture Association of America, New Mastodon Books and Fine Arts, Pacific Palisades Historical Society, Prinz Medien, Santa Monica Museum of Art, The Claremont Colleges, The Odysee Theater, UCLA Hammer Museum, Victoria Daily Publishing. www.ninafranoszek.com 3 .