80 years after the end of the Second World War, 203 new portrait photographs of deportees unveiled
Mechelen, 28/11/2025 – On Thursday 27 November, the thirteenth edition of the annual Portrait Ceremony took place at Kazerne Dossin. This year 203 new portraits were unveiled, that is more than double the amount of portraits that was revealed in the previous edition of the ceremony. 136 portraits were added to the Portrait Wall in the museum. Thanks to these new additions, a portrait can now be displayed for 21,162 of the 25,843 deportees.
An exceptional number of portraits, 80 years after liberation
Researchers are still searching daily for visual material of the Jews, Roma and Sinti who were deported from Mechelen. That such a large number of portraits could be unveiled this year is remarkable. Dorien Styven, archivist at Kazerne Dossin, explains how this was possible: ‘This year, we gained access for the first time to a new source: the post-war tracing cards. These were used to find people who had gone missing after the war. Many of these cards contain photographs. One of our researchers is examining these cards in the hope of finding more portraits – and successfully so.’
A second way in which photographs reach the research team is through donations. This year, for example, the photograph of Salomon Frey is being added. ‘Salomon was one of the founders of the Antwerp Diamond Bourse. Because of his contribution to the diamond trade, he was awarded the title of Knight of the Order of the Crown during the interwar period. He assumed that his status would protect him, but that proved not to be the case. He and his wife Ruchel Goldman were deported in January 1943. A few months later, their sons Max and Hendrik were also deported,’ explains curator and director collections & research Veerle Vanden Daelen. In June 2025, descendants of Salomon Frey travelled from the US to visit Kazerne Dossin. They brought with them photographs of Salomon, Ruchel and their sons Max and Hendrik.
The photographs are added to the Portrait Wall in the museum, a living monument that grows every year. The wall spans four floors and contains photographs or silhouettes representing all 25,843 people who were deported from the Dossin Barracks. 21,162 of them have now been given a portrait.
Thirteenth edition of the Portrait Ceremony
Since 2013, a year after the museum opened, Kazerne Dossin has organised an annual Portrait Ceremony. During this ceremony, the new portraits are unveiled and added to the monumental Portrait Wall. The victims are commemorated, and the researchers of Kazerne Dossin share insights into their search for photographs over the past year. During the ceremony, chairperson Marleen Vanderpoorten, curator and director collections & research Veerle Vanden Daelen, and archivist Dorien Styven addressed the audience. As every year, a group of pupils from Atheneum Busleyden – Campus Caputsteen, a local school, was invited to read out the names. Accompanying teacher Anne Ocket explains why this evening is so meaningful for the pupils: ‘Statistics are given a face, faces are given a name. History becomes tangible, real, lived reality. This is an evening the pupils will never forget.’
Not every deportee will receive a photograph
Researchers have been actively searching for portraits of deportees since 2004, even before the establishment of Kazerne Dossin. Completing the wall is a task that will never be finished, as a portrait will never be found for some individuals. In order to ensure that each of them regains part of their identity, the “Every name matters” project was launched two years ago. The project aims to have the names of all 25,843 deportees recorded by 25,843 unique voices. More than three quarters of the names have already been recorded.