ART : Pages From the Life of Anne Frank

Anne Frank, whose diary is required reading in many high schools, died 50 years ago, at the age of 15 and at the hands of the Nazis. “Anne Frank in the World,” an educational exhibit re-creating her life and times using more than 500 photographs from the Frank family albums and diary facsimiles, opens today at the Newport Harbor Art Museum’s Library Annex.

The dramatic photographs, discovered in 1978, emphasize that the Franks, like most of the millions of Holocaust victims, were ordinary people. Yet, with the opening of Holocaust-themed museums and worldwide distribution of the Oscar-winning movie “Schindler’s List,” some people are asking, “Haven’t we remembered enough?”

“The answer is a resounding no!” said Bruce Giuliano of Irvine, the traveling exhibit’s Orange County coordinator. “I don’t know that you can ever remember enough.

“This was the most horrendous event in human history. Much of the world stood by and did nothing. This episode reveals a great deal about us as human beings. We have to look at it; we have to understand it, and we’re a long way from that. If we had learned enough, we wouldn’t be seeing genocide around the world now and hate crimes increasing in this country.”

Giuliano mentioned several contemporary episodes of genocide, including in Cambodia and Rwanda.

“Every episode is different, but nonetheless, they go on,” he noted.

Several copies of “Anne Frank in the World,” in 14 languages, are touring internationally. The local organizing committee is working with school districts that have incorporated “Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl” into their curricula. The Los Angeles-based Committee of Concerned Christians has donated 40,000 copies of the book to local schools.

Students from five Orange County high schools and more than 100 adults have volunteered to act as docents; 27 mentor-teachers have been trained. Giuliano says they have a local as well as a universal message to get across.

“We want people in this community to see that, even though these events happened half a century ago and half a world away, they continue to have an effect on people in our own community,” he said. “We can’t wrap them up and put them away.

“There are people in our community who were in the camps and survived the camps. There are people in this community who lost an entire generation in the camps. There are youngsters in this community who have grown up without grandparents . . . .

“One of our student docents, it took her a long time to understand why her family was so much smaller than her friends’ families. It wasn’t until she was in high school that she understood that much of her family was murdered in a concentration camp.”

Giuliano, who sold his wholesale bakery in 1992, has spent 18 months coordinating this exhibit as a volunteer. He is not a Jew, but there may be a parallel here with Anne Frank’s father, Otto.

Otto Frank, the only Amsterdam-based member of the family to survive the Holocaust, reportedly said after the war that he overcame his grief by turning his life and activities to teaching people about the nature of prejudice and violence. Giuliano, 52, lost a 23-year-old son, not to hate, but in a sports accident in 1991.

“To some extent, some of this is done in his memory,” Giuliano said. “But it’s important to make the point that to the same extent I do it in his memory, I do it for my two surviving sons. Those are the ones I am concerned about. I am concerned about the world they will live in.”

* What: “Anne Frank in the World.”

* When: Through June 18. Hours are 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Saturday, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday.

* Where: Library Annex, Newport Harbor Art Museum, 856 San Clemente Drive, Newport Beach.

* Whereabouts: Take the San Diego (405) Freeway to the Jamboree Road exit, and head south. Turn left on Santa Barbara Drive and left again on San Clemente Drive.

* Wherewithal: Adults $4, senior citizens $3, 18 and under free. (Recommended for children 10 and over.)

* Where to call: (714) 724-1009.

Exhibit-Related Happenings

Educational programs and events have been scheduled in conjunction with “Anne Frank in the World.” Among the speakers are survivors and liberators now living in Orange County. Unless otherwise noted, programs will be held in the Library Annex and are included with exhibit admission. For more information, phone (714) 724-1009.

* Friday, April 21, at 8 p.m.: Holocaust memorial service conducted by University Synagogue.

* Saturday, April 22, at 8 p.m.: “Teshuvah, Return,” a one-woman show by Vicki Juditz at Temple Beth Shalom in Santa Ana ($18); the show raises funds for student transportation to the exhibit.

* Wednesday, April 26, at 8 p.m.: Orange County Jewish Federation sponsors Yom Hashoah observances at Temple Beth Shalom in Santa Ana.

* April 27 and 28 at 11:30 a.m.: Lecture by Robert Hasen, the first American soldier to enter a German concentration camp.

* April 29 and 30 at 3 p.m.: Lecture by Father John Neiman and Rose DeLiema. Neiman was a friend of Otto Frank; DeLiema, of Mission Viejo, was in Bergen-Belsen with Anne Frank.

* May 3 at 7 p.m.: Orange County Human Relations Commission director Rusty Kennedy discusses local human relations resources.

* May 4 and 5 at 7:30 p.m.: Commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the liberation of the Netherlands, sponsored by Netherlands’ Consulate General. (75% of Dutch Jews were killed during World War II.)

* May 7 at 2 p.m.: Memorial program marking the 80th anniversary of the Armenian genocide (more than 1.5 million were murdered); guests include three survivors.

* May 12 at 11 a.m.: Speaker Irene Gut Opdyke of Yorba Linda. Opdyke hid 12 Jewish friends from Nazis in Poland.

* May 13 at 2 p.m.: “America’s Concentration Camps,” a presentation and discussion on Japanese American internment.

* May 24 at 7 p.m.: “Many Faiths, One Community,” a panel discussion.

* May 27 and May 28 at 2 p.m.: Lecture by Fullerton resident Leon Leyson, the youngest person on Schindler’s list.