Polish Girl

Czeslawa Kwoka, Polish girl, 14 years old. She died in the Auschwitz death camp on February 18, 1943 from an injection of phenol into the heart. Shortly before her execution, she was photographed by prisoner Vilém Brasset, who testified against Czeslawa’s executioner, a Nazi who hit her in the face shortly before the photo, as evidenced by a hematoma on her lip.

All we see is the face of a frightened child who lost her mother a few days ago. She was one of approximately 250,000 minor children executed at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The photograph, originally in black and white, located at the Auschwitz Memorial, was colourised by Brazilian professional photographer Marina Amaral, who was impressed by Czeslawa’s photograph and decided to colour it and make it available to everyone so that people would not forget the horrors of nazism and fascism.