"Never Again."
These are the key words that speak the message of the "Darkness Into Life" art exhibit featured at the Lewis Cooper Jr. Memorial Library in Opelika.
The exhibit, which makes stops throughout the state of Alabama, features striking portraits that depict the spectrum of human emotion told through the faces of 20 Holocaust survivors who relocated to Alabama during and after World War II.
Artist Mitzi Levin and photographer Becky Seitel began the project in 2006 after Seitel heard a Holocaust survivor speak at her husband's synagogue.
"It was such a revealing experience," Seitel said. "At first, it made me think of two things. If I hadn't heard this before, who else hasn't, and second, how will my grandchildren hear about it?"
The portraits that decorate the library walls reveal the survivors' pain during their darkest times, but they also celebrate the lives of the survivors after the war.
"The objective of it is mainly for the children, so they don't forget what happened," said Henry Stern, Opelika resident and Holocaust survivor featured in the exhibit.
Now 79, Stern moved from Germany to Opelika with his family in 1937 on the last boat that allowed Jews to legally leave the nation. He later attended Auburn University, joined the military and went on to work at the Opelika Chamber of Commerce.
At the exhibit, which is broken down by country of origin, Stern's portrait is the first. While his painting reflects the joy he had the first time he saw the Statue of Liberty, the photograph captures him at his computer where he spent hours trying to locate relatives.
"Over 50 years I was trying to figure out if anyone survived," Stern said. "When I traveled, I would always pick up a phone book and call anyone who shared my last name."
After years of searching and possessing the last photograph taken at his family farm in Germany, Stern found a cousin in 2004 living in Durham, N.C.
"He called me after I scanned him the picture I had," Stern said. "He said, 'Are you sitting down--because I am one of those boys in the picture'."
While Stern never spent time at a concentration camp, many of the survivors featured at the exhibit did, and their portraits now serve as a reminder, encouraging the viewer to never forget the events that happened some 70 years ago.
"We're very fortunate to have the exhibit here," said Marsha Sanson, reference librarian in Opelika. "One of my favorite pieces is 'Clean Sheets,' but so many of the pieces are moving.
In 'Clean Sheets,' one of the survivors is pictured gently clutching fresh linen, something she said they never had in the camps.
Among all of the anguish that the resilient survivors faced during the Holocaust, Seitel said she was surprised to see many of them without any bitterness.
"Every time we brought it up in an interview, they would each answer the same way: 'If we were bitter, Hitler would have won,'" Seitel said.
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