Exile in Paradise

The origins of Friends and Supporters of the Villa Aurora (non-profit association)

Marta Feuchtwanger died in autumn 1987. Professor Harold von Hofe, a close friend and executor of the Feuchtwangers' estate, asked the journalist and Feuchtwanger biographer Volker Skierka to launch an initiative to save the dilapidated building. He won the support of the media and numerous public figures. The then head of the publishing house Rowohlt, Michael Naumann, cultural journalist Fritz J. Raddatz and Freimut Duve, a member of the German parliament, gave the initiative a goal by stating that it should become a kind of "Villa Massimo on the Pacific", in reference to the German art institute in Rome.