Echoes of Memory Podcast | Episode 6: The Memory of Roma Holocaust in Contemporary Art
In the sixth episode of the Echoes of Memory podcast, curator and moderator Timea Junghaus sits down with artists Lila Loisse, Riah Knight, and Petro Rusanienko to explore how Roma artists carry and transform the memory of the Roma Holocaust through creative practice. Together, they reflect on personal awakenings, silences and institutional erasure, and how contemporary art can bridge gaps in public memory. From installations and poetry to performance and film, the conversation traces how younger generations are finding new ways to resist forgetting — and how art keeps memory alive.
Developed by the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture (ERIAC), in partnership with the Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future (EVZ), the podcast series Echoes of Memory – Roma Youth for Holocaust Remembrance explores the history and legacy of the Roma Holocaust through the experiences and perspectives of Roma youth.
Meet the participants
Lila Loisse (b. 2000) is a Belgian artist of Sinti Manouche heritage, living and working in London. Her work is deeply rooted in family history, particularly the unspoken traumas of her grandparents, Sinté survivors of WWII. Through her practice, she explores collective memory, resilience, and how histories are preserved or erased over generations.
Using personal archives, found objects, and immersive installations, she creates poetic narratives that intertwine sound, film, and sculpture. Fire, hay, and metal frequently appear in her work, evoking themes of survival, protection, and ritual. Her practice is also informed by an interest in oral traditions and the transmission of knowledge within travelling communities.
Lila holds a BA in Fine Art from Arts University Bournemouth, an MA in Contemporary Art Practice from the Royal College of Art, and is currently pursuing an MRes at the Royal College of Art.
Riah Knight is a British-Romani artist based in Berlin. The musician, actress and writer first gained recognition in theatre and regularly works at the Maxim Gorki Theatre and with collective Glossy Pain. Knight’s artistic work positions a feminist agenda at its core, and has often been directed towards social justice. Her latest EP ‘Wicked Laughter’ casts a speculative light across the darker sides of femininity – woven within traditions of R&B, folk, trip-hop and performance poetry, it paints a sonic landscape for the political reimagining of female aggression and desire.
Riah has been an Associate Member of the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture since its foundation in 2017 and is one of the directors of the CIC Talking Romani. She has also worked with Berlin grassroots organisation RomaTrial, co-founding the project Romnja Jazz. She is one of the hosts of the prestigious Tajsa Roma Cultural Heritage Prize and in 2024 hosted the opening event of international conference ‘My testimony is for young people – Passing on Memory for the Future of Holocaust Remembrance and Education’ held in Kraków University, which marked the 80th anniversary of 2 August, European Holocaust Memorial Day for Sinti and Roma.
Tímea Junghaus is an art historian and contemporary art curator. She started in the position of Executive Director of the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture in September 2017. Previously, Junghaus was Research Fellow of the Working Group for Critical Theories at the Institute for Art History at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (2010-2017). She has researched and published extensively on the conjunctions of modern and contemporary art with critical theory, with particular reference to issues of cultural difference, colonialism, and minority representation. She is completing her Ph.D. studies in Cultural Theory at the Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest.
In recognition of her curatorial activities, Junghaus received the Kairos – European Cultural Price from the Alfred Toepfer Stiftung F.V.S., in 2008. Her curatorial works include the Roma component of the Hidden Holocaust- exhibition in the Budapest Kunsthalle (2004), Paradise Lost – the First Roma Pavilion at the 52nd Venice Contemporary Art Biennale (2007), the Archive and Scholarly Conference on Roma Hiphop (2010), The Romani Elders and the Public Intervention for the Unfinished Memorial to the Sinti and Roma Murdered Under the National Socialist Regime in the frame of the 7th Berlin Biennale (2012), the (Re-)Conceptualizing Roma Resistance – exhibition and education program in Hellerau, Dresden (2015) and the Goethe Institute, Prague (2016). She is the curator of the Visual Arts Section for RomArchive – Digital Archive of the Roma, funded by Kulturstiftung des Bundes (2015-2018).
Junghaus was the founding director of Gallery8 – Roma Contemporary Art Space (www.gallery8.org) in Budapest (2013-2017), the winner of the 2014 Catalyst Contemporary Art Award (of Tranzit Hungary) and the 2014 Otto Pankok Prize awarded by the For Roma Foundation of German writer and Literary Nobel Laureate, Günter Grass.
The podcast series Echoes of Memory – Roma Youth for Holocaust Remembrance is developed by the European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture (ERIAC), funded by the EVZ Foundation and the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM) within the programme ‘YOUNG PEOPLE remember on site & committed’, and supported by the Council of Europe, Roma Foundation for Europe, and Open Society Foundations.
This publication does not represent an opinion of the EVZ Foundation or the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM). The author is responsible for the content statements.
