art

Apr 29, 2025

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter MAY 2025

2025-04-29T10:30:15-04:00April 29th, 2025|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter MAY 2025

Dear Friends, May is the month during which we celebrate the fifth anniversary of our virtual event series "Flight or Fight. stories of artists under repression." You can now find about 150 artist videos on our YouTube channel @fritzaschersociety! Throughout this month, we ask you to donate to the Fritz Ascher Society to enable us to continue this important virtual program, which brings artists to a global audience, who are not widely known because they were persecuted or murdered by the German Nazis. We need to raise $10,000.00 to ensure the continuation of this program. And I am happy to announce that every donation made this month will be matched dollar-for-dollar until we reach that amount, so please: [...]

Apr 2, 2025

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter APRIL 2025

2025-04-29T10:31:47-04:00April 2nd, 2025|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter APRIL 2025

Dear Friends, Spring is here, with the energy of renewal and growth and blossoming trees, plants and flowers. Holidays abound, and we honor Yom HaShoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. We have organized fabulous virtual events for you, but first I have a story with a happy ending for you, at least for the art: Pretty exactly a year ago, the reporter and writer Julie Zigoris told the story of artwork that was found on a park bench in San Francisco’s Crane Cove Park in 2022. City employees had rescued the art and found the majority of the artworks to be by the Jewish painter Ary Arcadie Lochakov (1892-1941), a member of the famed School of Paris group that includes [...]

Mar 7, 2025

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter MARCH 2025

2025-04-29T10:32:39-04:00March 7th, 2025|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter MARCH 2025

Dear Friends, During these breathtakingly turbulent times, we prepared very diverse online programs for you: we start this month by looking back at US history by discussing immigrant American artist Ben Shahn, then focus on the state of Nazi era art restitution by presenting the much disputed collection of the Jewish art dealer Alfred Flechtheim, and conclude the month with a panel discussion of curator Ori Z Soltes, poet Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, and photographer Kitra Cahana about our Portland (OR) exhibition Survival and Intimations of Immortality: The Art of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, and Kitra Cahana, which is on view until May 25. First we present the American artist, Social Realist painter, and child refugee from Tzarist-governed [...]

Mar 6, 2025

Art and Conscience in a Time of Upheaval.
Ben Shahn (1898-1969)
Presentation by Ori Z Soltes, Washington (DC)

2025-03-12T14:22:13-04:00March 6th, 2025|, , |Comments Off on Art and Conscience in a Time of Upheaval.
Ben Shahn (1898-1969)
Presentation by Ori Z Soltes, Washington (DC)

Georgetown University professor Ori Z Soltes will speak about Ben Shahn (1898-1969), who arrived in 1906 as a child to the United States from Tsarist-governed Lithuania. Four years after the Tsarist authorities had exiled his father to Siberia for alleged revolutionary activities, his mother managed to bring the family to New York. There they reconnected with Ben's father who had escaped from Siberia and made it to the US by way of South Africa. Image above: Ben Shahn, Detail of the Mural "The Meaning of Social Security," Wilbur J. Cohen Federal Building, Washington, D.C. Within 25 years Shahn emerged as perhaps the key figure in the developing arena of American Social [...]

Feb 12, 2025

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter FEBRUARY 2025 with Signs and Wonders

2025-02-12T07:45:33-05:00February 12th, 2025|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter FEBRUARY 2025 with Signs and Wonders

Dear Friends, February is a busy month with many interesting events in our orbit, starting with two film screenings at the JCC Manhattan, continuing with a virtual conversation with author Melvin Bukiet and a presentation of Fritz Ascher's art, and two exhibitions, of which one is closing in early March in Germany, and one just opened in Portland, Oregon. Please join us at the JCC Manhattan for two important film screenings: Tuesday, February 4, 7:00PM ET The Return from the Other Planet, 2023 Screening followed by Q+A with director Assaf Lapid Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, New York 20% off tickets with code fritz2025 Tuesday, February 11, [...]

Jan 20, 2025

Opening reception
SURVIVAL AND INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY:
The Arts of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana and Kitra Cahana
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, Portland, Oregon

2025-01-27T07:31:46-05:00January 20th, 2025|, |Comments Off on Opening reception
SURVIVAL AND INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY:
The Arts of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana and Kitra Cahana
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, Portland, Oregon

Please join us for the opening event! Survival and Intimations of Immortality: The Art of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, and Kitra Cahana is a unique and powerful exhibition that explores the role of art and creativity, bringing the past into the present by focusing on three generations of artists from the same family. Alice Lok Cahana (1929-2017) was a Holocaust survivor who pledged she would become an artist if she survived the war. Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, Alice’s oldest son, is a poet and survivor of a major stroke. Kitra Cahana, Ronnie’s daughter, is a filmmaker and photographer. This exhibition reveals how the tragedy of the Holocaust impacted multiple generations of a family and how each member transformed [...]

Jan 2, 2025

Plunderer. The Life and Time of a Nazi Art Thief
Screening followed by Q+A with producer John Friedman
Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, New York

2025-02-12T14:47:01-05:00January 2nd, 2025|, , |Comments Off on Plunderer. The Life and Time of a Nazi Art Thief
Screening followed by Q+A with producer John Friedman
Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan, New York

Hermann Goering’s art dealer, Bruno Lohse, prospered by selling stolen art for decades after WWII, while Jewish families struggled to regain their paintings and memories. Captured and interrogated by the Monuments Men after the war, he served a brief prison sentence. After his release, he dealt profitably in stolen art for sixty years after the war, selling to collectors, galleries, and major museums. Highlighting stories of Holocaust survivors working to reclaim their families' lost artworks, Plunderer reveals the failures of post-war justice and the continuing complicity of governments and the art trade. Screening followed by Q+A with producer John Friedman. In partnership with The Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art. Director: Hugo Macgregor Year: 2024 Runtime: [...]

Dec 4, 2024

Love, Betrayal and Ascher’s Unpainted Pictures
Tour by Exhibition Curator Jutta Götzmann
Haus der Graphischen Sammlung, Freiburg (Germany)

2024-12-18T05:55:27-05:00December 4th, 2024|, , |Comments Off on Love, Betrayal and Ascher’s Unpainted Pictures
Tour by Exhibition Curator Jutta Götzmann
Haus der Graphischen Sammlung, Freiburg (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

Nov 22, 2024

SURVIVAL AND INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY:
The Arts of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana and Kitra Cahana
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, Portland, Oregon

2025-04-29T12:05:23-04:00November 22nd, 2024||Comments Off on SURVIVAL AND INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY:
The Arts of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana and Kitra Cahana
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, Portland, Oregon

Survival and Intimations of Immortality: The Art of Alice Lok Cahana, Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, and Kitra Cahana is a unique and powerful exhibition that explores the role of art and creativity, bringing the past into the present by focusing on three generations of artists from the same family. Alice Lok Cahana (1929-2017) was a Holocaust survivor who pledged she would become an artist if she survived the war. Rabbi Ronnie Cahana, Alice’s oldest son, is a poet and survivor of a major stroke. Kitra Cahana, Ronnie’s daughter, is a filmmaker and photographer. This exhibition reveals how the tragedy of the Holocaust impacted multiple generations of a family and how each member transformed the destructive trauma of the Shoah into [...]

Nov 21, 2024

Fred Kormis – Sculpting the Twentieth Century
Presentation by Barbara Warnock, London (England)

2025-01-09T14:27:52-05:00November 21st, 2024|, , |Comments Off on Fred Kormis – Sculpting the Twentieth Century
Presentation by Barbara Warnock, London (England)

Born in 1894 in Frankfurt into an Austrian and German Jewish family, Fred Kormis’ life and career were shaped and disrupted by some of the most significant events of the twentieth century. Kormis saw action and was wounded in the First World War as part of the Austrian army, before being held for four years as a prisoner of war in Siberia. Image above: Fred Kormis, Two Heads, c. 1930s © Wiener Holocaust Library Collections He worked as an artist during the politically and culturally tumultuous Weimar period, and during the Nazi era revealed himself to be Jewish, a decision that led to the removal of his art from galleries. Kormis and his wife Rachel Sender [...]

Nov 19, 2024

Gertrud Kauders, Jewish Artist from Prague (1883-1942):
Surprises, Enigmas, Opportunities
Presentation by Simon During, Brisbane (Australia)

2024-12-05T06:58:15-05:00November 19th, 2024|, , |Comments Off on Gertrud Kauders, Jewish Artist from Prague (1883-1942):
Surprises, Enigmas, Opportunities
Presentation by Simon During, Brisbane (Australia)

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 [...]

Oct 28, 2024

Liebe und Verrat: Fritz Ascher
Kurator Erik Riedel im Gespräch mit Rachel Stern
Jüdisches Museum Frankfurt (Germany)

2024-11-24T14:39:31-05:00October 28th, 2024|, , |Comments Off on Liebe und Verrat: Fritz Ascher
Kurator Erik Riedel im Gespräch mit Rachel Stern
Jüdisches Museum Frankfurt (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 [...]