Abounding in Technology and Inspired by an Expanded Mission, New Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum Opens in Downtown Dallas

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Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum

Sep 18, 2019, 04:00 ET

DALLAS, Sept. 18, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- The highly anticipated Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum opens to the public today, a dream 40 years in the making with an expanded mission to educate students and the public about the history of the Holocaust, human rights, and the ethical responsibility for all humanity to combat prejudice, hatred, and indifference.

The Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum will be unique among the nation's 21 Holocaust-related museums by expanding its examination of the Holocaust through technology-enriched galleries on human rights, other historic genocides, and America's own journey for civil rights.

Covering three floors and 55,000 square feet, the new Museum features 68 video testimonies from Dallas-area Holocaust Survivors, stunning artifacts from concentration and death camps, monumental displays of real locations like the Brandenburg Gate, and a fully restored Nazi-era boxcar.

Modern, immersive, and interactive technology will captivate over 200,000 visitors a year with a brand-new exhibition that includes four wings: Orientation, Holocaust/Shoah, Human Rights, and Pivot to America. Signature spaces like the Beyond Tolerance Theater will teach about unconscious bias, and the Ten Stages of Genocide Gallery will demonstrate how genocides progress.

The new Museum is one of only two in the world that has a permanent Dimensions in Testimony^SM Theater – an interactive, holographic project developed by the USC Shoah Foundation that will allow visitors to interact with a Holocaust Survivor long after they are of blessed memory.

"Our hope is that in this age of division, incivility, antisemitism, open acts of hatred, and the breakdown of public discourse, this new institution will become a catalyst for ethical growth here and abroad," said Mary Pat Higgins, Museum President and CEO.

A $10 million gift from Ann and Nate Levine of Dallas ensures that the Museum will be able to fulfill its mission for decades to come.

The new Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum is located at 300 N. Houston Street in Downtown Dallas. The Museum opens to the public on Wednesday, September 18, at 9:30 a.m.

OMNIPLAN Architects of Dallas designed the new LEED-certified building; the permanent exhibition is the creation of Berenbaum Jacobs Associates, under the stewardship of Dr. Michael Berenbaum, the former Project Director of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum; the General Contractor is Austin Commercial. Visit DHHRM.org.

SOURCE Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum