| A film by LINCOLN MAYORGA A SUITCASE FULL OF CHOCOLATE the life of pianist SOFIA COSMA |
| Thirty years in the making, "Suitcase" is the true story of a Russian-Jewish pianist Sofia Cosma, a phenomenal survivor of the cataclysmic events of the twentieth century, a great musician and teacher, a musical career lost and found after many years of imprisonment and hard labor, and a devoted mother. Sofia took high honors in the Viennese International Piano Competition of 1933. When Hitler invaded Austria in 1938, the young prize-winning Jewish pianist was forced to abandon her musical studies in Vienna and return to her home in Latvia. Subsequently she was arrested and sent to a Soviet labor camp where she endured seven years of hunger and cold. During imprisonment she married and became a mother. Two years after release, she reunited with her husband in Romania. The documentary was begun in 1980 at the time of her defection from Romania to the United States. |
| Screening & Performance May 16, 2012 noon National Gallery Washington, D.C. Screening preceded by performance and talk about the Russian piano school by Lincoln Mayorga See Calendar for details |