WWII
Steinberg before STEINBERG
Lecture by Mario Tedeschini Lalli, Rome (Italy)
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VA, United States
In this presentation Mario Tedeschini Lalli, Italian journalist and scholar of 20th century history, tells the story of Saul Steinberg, before he became STEINBERG, the majuscules with which he signed his name to the art most people know, using some of his public art, some of his clandestine art, some of his personal art and - yes – some of his top secret art. Image above: Saul Steinberg, Seaside, 1941. © The Saul Steinberg Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS) New York The art of Saul Steinberg (1914-1999) was arguably one of the most recognizable for the US public from the mid-1940s until his death in 1999. Much of Steinberg’s best-known work appeared in magazines such as [...]
From Auschwitz to Hollywood: Jack Garfein, “THE WILD ONE”
Film Screening and Conversation with French producer Chantal Perrin
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THE WILD ONE illuminates the journey of unsung artist Jack Garfein (1930-2019) - Holocaust survivor, celebrated Broadway director, Actors Studio West co-founder, and controversial filmmaker. The film examines how his experience in Nazi concentration camps shaped his vision of acting as a survival mechanism and propelled his engagement with themes of violence, power, and racism in postwar America in two explosive films: THE STRANGE ONE (1957) and SOMETHING WILD (1961). THE WILD ONE explores the importance of his legacy as an artist who confronted censorship and reveals how art can draw on personal memory to better enlighten our present. Image above: Photo of Jack Garfein. Courtesy of Petite Maison Production WATCH THE TRAILER: [...]
Art and Internment.
Heinz Henghes the Stowaway Sculptor
Presentation by Ian Henghes, London (UK)
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Heinz Henghes (1906-1975) was born in Hamburg in 1906, a ‘Mischling’ of mixed Jewish and German descent. In America for almost 10 years before returning to Europe at a time of great political unrest Heinz spent time in Italy where he enjoyed the patronage of Ezra Pound, despite Pounds noted anti-semitism. In London at the outbreak of war Heinz was interned and sent to Australia on the notorious ship the Dunera. Ian Henghes, the artist's son, presents his father’s extraordinary story and the contact he had with other artists, writers and thinkers of his time. Image above: Heinz Henghes in Milan studio ca 1935 © Ian Henghes Ian Henghes is an online communications specialist working [...]
Fritz Ascher in Berlin – eine Spurensuche
Kurzvortrag und Führung von Rachel Stern, New York
Augustinermuseum, Haus der Graphischen Sammlung, Freiburg
Augustinermuseum
Augustinerplatz, Freiburg im Breisgau
Der spätexpressionistische Künstler Fritz Ascher (1893-1970) überlebte zwei Weltkriege und die Verfolgung durch das nationalsozialistische Regime. Als aufmerksamer Beobachter der Schrecken des Ersten Weltkriegs und der revolutionären Unruhen wandte er sich christlich-spirituellen Themen zu, die er radikal neu interpretierte. In intimen Zeichnungen beschäftigte er sich ab 1916 mit dem Thema Liebe und Verrat, sowohl in seiner Auseinandersetzung mit dem Kreuzigungsthema als auch mit der Figur des Bajazzo in der tragikomischen Oper „I Pagliacci“. Kurzvortrag und Führung von Rachel Stern zeigen den Künstler in seinem sozialen und politischen Umfeld. Image above: Fritz Ascher, Im Wald, um 1919. Weisse Gouache und schwarze Tusche über Aquarell und Bleistift auf Papier, 34 x 32,2 cm © Bianca Stock The late expressionist [...]
Liebe und Verrat: Fritz Ascher
Kurator Erik Riedel im Gespräch mit Rachel Stern
Jüdisches Museum Frankfurt (Germany)
Jewish Museum Frankfurt
Bertha-Pappenheim-Platz 1, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Der Maler, Grafiker und Dichter Fritz Ascher (1893-1970) wurde bereits als 16-Jähriger von Max Liebermann an die Akademie in Königsberg empfohlen. Ab 1913 gehörte er zu den gefragten Malern in Berlin. Er war ein genauer Beobachter seiner Zeit; die Urkatastrophe des Ersten Weltkriegs und die revolutionären Unruhen in Berlin führten ihn zu christlichen und mystischen Themen, die er radikal neu interpretierte. Nach 1933 erhielt Ascher als Jude Berufsverbot. Während der Pogrome am 9./10. November 1938 wurde er verhaftet und im Konzentrationslager Sachsenhausen und im Potsdamer Gestapo-Gefängnis interniert. Die Schoa überlebte er ab 1942 versteckt in einem Keller in Berlin-Grunewald. Während dieser einsamen Jahre verfasste er Gedichte. Als Künstler fand Ascher nach 1945 seinen ganz eigenen Stil. Angeregt vom nahe [...]
Felka Platek – Artist and Companion of the Painter Felix Nussbaum
Presentation by Anne Sibylle Schwetter, Osnabrück (Germany)
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Felka Platek (1899 Warsaw – 1944 Auschwitz) came to Berlin from Warsaw in the early 1920s to become a painter. In 1932 she followed her friend and later husband Felix Nussbaum (1904 Osnabrück – 1944 Auschwitz) to Italy. In 1935 they decided to go into exile in Belgium. However, neither of them could escape persecution by the Nazis. They were captured in their hiding place in Brussels on June 21, 1944 and murdered in Auschwitz shortly afterwards. Image above: Felka Platek, Self-portrait in front of an open window, around 1940. Gouache on drawing paper, 65 x 49.7 cm. Felix-Nussbaum-Haus at Museumsquartier Osnabrück, on permanent loan from the Felix Nussbaum Foundation, photo © Felix-Nussbaum-Haus Osnabrück Anne [...]
Gertrud Kauders, Jewish Artist from Prague (1883-1942):
Surprises, Enigmas, Opportunities
Presentation by Simon During, Brisbane (Australia)
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While workmen were demolishing a house on Prague’s outskirts in July 2018 they were astonished to be deluged by works of art falling from a ceiling. Nobody knew the works had been hidden there. The art turned out to be that of Gertrud Kauders who had hidden them in the house of a friend before being deported to Theresienstadt and then to Majdanek where she was murdered on arrival in May 1942. Kauders was a serious and inventive artist, quite well known in Prague’s art world of the time. She worked in oils, pencil, crayon, watercolour and gouache. Now her work is held by museums around the world. Image above: Gertrud Kauders © Kauders Family Estate [...]
Love, Betrayal and Ascher’s Unpainted Pictures
Tour by Exhibition Curator Jutta Götzmann
Haus der Graphischen Sammlung, Freiburg (Germany)
Haus der Graphischen Sammlung
Salzstraße 34, Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany
Jutta Götzmann, exhibition curator of "Love and Betrayal," presents the artist Fritz Ascher (1893-1970) during a tour. In addition to early charcoal, graphite and ink drawings, colorful gouaches are fascinating. Poems that are considered his "unpainted pictures" and were created in secret during the National Socialist era complement the exhibition. BUY TICKETS HERE The Fritz Ascher Society is a not-for-profit 501(c)3 organization. Your donation is fully tax deductible. YOUR SUPPORT MAKES OUR WORK POSSIBLE. THANK YOU. DONATE HERE
World Premiere: Kafka’s Last Trial
Screening at Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan
Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan
334 Amsterdam Ave, New York, NY, United States
Screening followed by Q+A with director Eliran Peled, writer Daphne Merkin, and author Benjamin Balint. Film and screening offered in partnership with the New York Jewish Week. Co-sponsored by Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art. Upon his death in 1924, the great Czech-Austrian novelist Franz Kafka left behind a rich collection of unpublished manuscripts, with instructions to his friend Max Brod to burn them all. Thanks to Brod’s failure to fulfill Kafka’s wishes, the world has come to know one of the great writers of the 20th century. Now, 100 years after his death, the film “Kafka’s Last Trial” tells the story of this altruistic betrayal and the multi-generational effort to preserve Kafka’s literary legacy. Based on [...]
Behind the Glass: The Villa Tugendhat and Its Family
A book talk by Michael Lambek, Toronto (Canada)
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In this book talk, Michael Lambek follows the intertwined history of Mies van der Rohe’s iconic Villa Tugendhat and the family who inhabited it from 1930-1938. Part memoir, part social history, the book traces the family from its origins in a Jewish ghetto to the present day, focussing on the author’s maternal grandmother, Grete Tugendhat who commissioned and championed the house, which is now a World Heritage Site in Brno, Czechia. Image above: Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Villa Tugendhat, Brno (Czechia), photo David Zidlicky The Villa Tugendhat, designed by Mies van der Rohe in 1929, is an icon of architectural modernism in Brno, Czechia. It was also a family home. [...]
