Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Never Forget

Today is International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this day 71 years ago, the Soviet Army liberated Auschwitz, one of the worst concentration camps.

Even though I studied and read quite a bit on the Holocaust during graduate school and in my own free time, it's still difficult for me to wrap my head around how such a cultured nation as Germany could allow it to happen. Historians are still trying to answer this question.

For today, though, I'd like to feature some artwork from survivors of the camps that shows how they felt after liberation. This online exhibit is at Yad Vashem's website. I encourage you to look at all of the art and read about the artists.

Here's one that particularly wrenches my heart:

Israel Alfred Glück (1921 – 2007)

Liberation, from the album My Holocaust
Drawn at Bergen-Belsen DP Camp, 1945
Charcoal on paper
Israel was first sent to Auschwitz in 1943, and ended up in Buchenwald in 1945 where he was liberated.

I urge you to take a moment today to remember the Holocaust. We must keep its memory alive.

Never Again.

5 comments:

  1. The other night I watched the making of a documentary from 1945 that Alfred Hitchcock was brought in to help edit before it was shelved. Even though I've seen these documentaries before it was still just as shocking and disturbing. You are right we must keep this memory alive.

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    Replies
    1. It worries me that, as the years go on, we will forget. We barely remember WW1 here in America and that was only 100 years ago. Part of the reason I'm so vocal about teaching WW2 - so we d o not forget.

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  2. Yes, must never forget. Thanks for the link to the online exhibit. Those are powerful drawings.

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  3. I think you're right, Melissa. Forgetting leaves the door wide open to denial and reconstructing.

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