Generations join to honour Holocaust Memorial Day with art project

A CARE home and six Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) schools in Tameside have collaborated to create an art project for Holocaust Memorial Day.

Tameside Council’s Cultural Services Team has embraced the 2026 Holocaust Memorial Day theme, ‘Bridging Generations’, by bringing residents together to take part in this year’s commemorations.

Thomas Ashton School, Oakdale Nursery and Primary School, Samuel Laycock School, Cromwell High School, Safe Start School Ashton and Hawthorns Primary School, along with residents from the Lakes Care Home in Dukinfield, have used their creativity to explore this year’s theme.

The art installation was unveiled at Thomas Ashton School in Hyde on Holocaust Memorial Day (27 January) and will now tour the other schools each week.

The Civic Mayor of Tameside Cllr Shibley Alam attended the unveiling along with the Mayor’s Consort Mr Khairul Alam, ward councillors Cllr Helen Bowden, Cllr Hugh Roderick, and Cllr Peter Robinson, students from the schools, and residents from the care home.

The project serves to honour the ongoing remembrance carried through each generation, while acknowledging the significance of the event and the history it represents.

The art installation, inspired by artist Peter Walker, centred on the decoration of doves. Residents involved received a dove to personalise in their own way, and more than 500 were collected in total.

Each school has an assigned colour, and a survivor’s name will be attached to each dove with a label in that colour. In this way, the dove symbolically carries the survivor’s story out into the world.

Tameside Council’s Executive Member for Lifelong Learning and Culture, Cllr Leanne Feeley said: “This is such a heartwarming project that brings residents across generations together with a unified aim of remembrance and commemoration.  The art project is a powerful display of shared hopes ‘For a Better Future’.

“Holocaust Memorial Day is also a reminder to people of all ages to use our freedom for good, whether that be through community projects or working together to make a positive difference to the lives of others.”

Teacher, Kim from Thomas Ashton School, said: “We hope our children will understand how powerful stories can be and how sharing experiences encourages us all to engage actively with the past - to listen, to learn and to carry those lessons forward. By doing so, we build a bridge between memory and action, between history and hope for the future.”