refugee Archives - Fritz Ascher Society

Oct 25, 2023

Eva Zeisel, Designer Extraordinaire
Lecture by daughter Jean Richards, New York

Rachel Stern2023-09-29T13:23:17-04:00October 25th, 2023|Events, Lectures|Comments Off on Eva Zeisel, Designer Extraordinaire
Lecture by daughter Jean Richards, New York

Eva Zeisel (born Éva Amália Striker, Budapest 1906 –2011 New City, New York) was one of the most important designers of the 20th century. She believed that beautiful things make people happy. Although she was known for her ceramic tableware, she also designed in glass, wood, plastic and metal. Her designs are in major museums around the world, including the Metropolitan Museum, the British Museum and MoMA, where she had the first one woman show in 1946. Lecture by Eva’s daughter Jean Richards. Image above: Eva Zeisel, Red Wing Pottery pieces from "Town and Country" collection. Glazed earthenware, ca. 1945. CC BY 4.0 REGISTER HERE FOR ONLINE EVENT Photograph of a young [...]

Oct 11, 2023

Samson Schames: Fragments of Exile
Lecture by Annika Friedman, Frankfurt

Rachel Stern2023-08-23T21:25:19-04:00October 11th, 2023|Events, Lectures|Comments Off on Samson Schames: Fragments of Exile
Lecture by Annika Friedman, Frankfurt

This event is sponsored by Ilona Oltuski in memory of Ruth Drory. Samson Schames (1898-1967) came from a long-established Jewish family in Frankfurt am Main. With the support of his uncle, renowned gallery owner Ludwig Schames, he made his way into the 1920s art scene and began his training as a painter, graphic artist, and stage designer. Schames’ designs, drawings, and oil paintings from the period up to 1933 testify to his deep connection to Frankfurt and her landscapes. Image above: Samson Schames, Blowing the Shofar, c. 1956. Glass tiles on glass, 56 x 71 cm. Jewish Museum Frankfurt REGISTER HERE FOR ONLINE EVENT Samson Schames, Opernplatz Frankfurt, 1930. Jewish Museum Frankfurt [...]

Sep 27, 2023

Art for the Millions:
American Culture and Politics in the 1930s
Lecture by Allison Rudnick, New York

Rachel Stern2023-09-27T14:24:53-04:00September 27th, 2023|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Art for the Millions:
American Culture and Politics in the 1930s
Lecture by Allison Rudnick, New York

The 1930s was a decade of political and social upheaval in the United States, and the art and visual culture of the time reflected the unsettled environment. Americans searched for their cultural identity during the Great Depression, a period marked by divisive politics, threats to democracy, and intensified social activism, including a powerful labor movement. The exhibition with the same title, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art New York until December 10, 2023, features more than 100 works from the collection and several lenders, and explores how artists expressed political messages and ideologies through a range of media, from paintings, sculptures, prints, and photographs to film, dance, decorative arts, fashion, and ephemera. Highlights include paintings by Georgia [...]

Sep 13, 2023

From Émigré to Englishman: Fred Uhlman, ‘Painter of Dreams’
Lecture by Dr. Nicola Baird, London

Rachel Stern2023-09-13T13:30:35-04:00September 13th, 2023|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on From Émigré to Englishman: Fred Uhlman, ‘Painter of Dreams’
Lecture by Dr. Nicola Baird, London

Manfred [Fred] Uhlman was born on 19th January 1901 in Stuttgart, Germany, the eldest child of Ludwig Uhlman (1869–c.1943), a textile merchant, and his wife, Johanna Grombacher (1879–c.1943), both of whom were later to perish at Theresienstadt concentration camp. He studied law at the Universities of Freiburg, Munich, and Tübingen, graduating with a doctorate in 1923. In 1927 he joined the Social Democrat Party, becoming its official legal representative in 1932. Image above: Fred Uhlman, Still Life with African Figures, oil on canvas, Hatton Gallery, © the artist's estate / Bridgeman Images. Photo credit: Hatton Gallery In March 1933, after a warning that his arrest was imminent because of his political affiliations, he fled [...]

Aug 23, 2023

THE ISLAND OF EXTRAORDINARY CAPTIVES
Book Talk by author Simon Parkin, London

Rachel Stern2023-08-23T14:13:45-04:00August 23rd, 2023|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on THE ISLAND OF EXTRAORDINARY CAPTIVES
Book Talk by author Simon Parkin, London

In May 1940, faced with a country gripped by paranoia, Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill ordered the internment of all German and Austrian citizens living in the country. Most were refugees who had come to the country to escape Nazi oppression. They were now imprisoned by the country in which they had staked their trust. More than 1,200 men were taken to Hutchinson camp, on the Isle of Man, which a group of world-renowned artists, musicians and academics turned into history’s most extraordinary prison camp. This is a story of a battle between fear and compassion at a time of national crisis that reveals how Britain’s treatment of refugees during the Second World War led to one of the [...]

Sep 7, 2022

Behind the Bronze.
The Sculptor Maurice Blik (born 1939 Amsterdam)
Featuring Maurice Blik and Julian Freeman (both London, UK)

Rachel Stern2022-09-07T15:52:51-04:00September 7th, 2022|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Behind the Bronze.
The Sculptor Maurice Blik (born 1939 Amsterdam)
Featuring Maurice Blik and Julian Freeman (both London, UK)

Maurice Blik has lived in England since being liberated from Bergen Belsen concentration camp, where he was taken as a small child from his birthplace, Amsterdam. The ability to come to terms with this experience and to confront the face of humanity that he has witnessed, stayed silent in his life for some 40 years. It finally found a voice in the passionate sculptures which began to emerge in the late 1970s when he created a series of horses’ heads. These noble and benevolent creatures posses an energy and a life force that seem just barely harnessed long enough to take their shape in the clay itself. Later he progressed to more figurative work in which the irrepressible joy [...]

Aug 3, 2022

Ludwig and Else Meidner.
An Artist Couple Exiled in London
Lecture by Erik Riedel, Frankfurt/Main (Germany)

Rachel Stern2022-08-03T14:52:23-04:00August 3rd, 2022|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Ludwig and Else Meidner.
An Artist Couple Exiled in London
Lecture by Erik Riedel, Frankfurt/Main (Germany)

When Ludwig and Else Meidner met in 1925, he was already an established artist well-known for his so-called Apocalyptic Landscapes. Although Else started as Ludwig’s student, she developed a distinct independent style and he always praised her art as more refined than his own “coarse” works. As Else Meidner slowly gained recognition in Berlin art circles, her career was abruptly cut short by the Nazi-regime in 1933. She moved to Cologne with her husband in 1935; and they emigrated to England in 1939 only a few weeks before the war started. In London both lived largely unnoticed by the English art scene. But while Ludwig frustratedly returned to Germany, she decided to stay in England. Their complicated relationship developed from [...]

Jul 26, 2022

Death and Immortality:
The Gentle Power of Hans von Trotha’s “Pollak’s Arm”
Hans von Trotha and Ori Z Soltes in conversation

Rachel Stern2022-08-25T13:01:20-04:00July 26th, 2022|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Death and Immortality:
The Gentle Power of Hans von Trotha’s “Pollak’s Arm”
Hans von Trotha and Ori Z Soltes in conversation

Ludwig Pollak (Prague 1868-1943 Auschwitz) was an extraordinary connoisseur of antiquities--an Austro-Hungarian Jew whose path into academia was impeded by his religion, but who settled in Rome, where he carved out a unique place for himself as an expert in recognizing, understanding, and organizing great works of art. It was he who shaped and articulated the magnificent collections of JP Morgan. Of perhaps even greater consequence, his astute eye saw a sculpted fragment of an arm in a flea market that, he deduced, was the limb missing from the spectacular Hellenistic-Roman sculptural group known as Laocoon. He gifted that arm fragment to the Vatican so that it might complete the work that occupied an important place within [...]

May 4, 2022

Prison Diaries by Hans Uhlmann, 1933-1935:
Drawing as Life Line
Featuring Dorothea Schöne, Berlin (Germany)

Rachel Stern2022-05-04T15:26:49-04:00May 4th, 2022|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Prison Diaries by Hans Uhlmann, 1933-1935:
Drawing as Life Line
Featuring Dorothea Schöne, Berlin (Germany)

On October 26, 1933, Hans Uhlmann was arrested by the Gestapo on the street. In the notorious Columbia-Haus, he was interrogated for several weeks and then found guilty by the court of appeal of “preparations for a traitorous enterprise.” He spent a year and a half in prison—first in Moabit and then in Tegel Prison. The artist recorded his experiences of those years in diaries. In parallel with these diaries, he produced four books of sketches. In his diary entries Uhlmann describes his arrest as well as scenes from daily life in confinement but above all his artistic concerns and projects: “I think often of freedom; of my first works; I occupy myself here by imagining these figures” (May [...]

Apr 26, 2022

FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter May 2022

Rachel Stern2022-04-28T09:33:15-04:00April 26th, 2022|Newsletter|Comments Off on FRITZ ASCHER SOCIETY Newsletter May 2022

Dear Friends, Thursday is Yom HaShoah - Holocaust Memorial Day. In January, we invited you to actively commemorate victims of National Socialism by contributing to the Arolsen Archive’s digital memorial #EVERYNAMECOUNTS. I know that some of you found the project so meaningful that you are still donating your time to it. Right now, you can choose to enter data of documents from Buchenwald, Flossenbürg or Dachau: PARTICIPATE HERE This Thursday, I invite all to donate time to help build this important digital memorial. On our website you find further information about the project and our partnership with the Arolsen Archive: https://fritzaschersociety.org/digifas/everynamecounts/ And please share your experience with us! In May, we turn to the experience of [...]

Apr 14, 2022

Identity, Art and Migration:
Artist Refugees from Nazi Germany and Today
School of Visual Arts, New York

Rachel Stern2022-05-02T14:41:57-04:00April 14th, 2022|Events, Past Events|Comments Off on Identity, Art and Migration:
Artist Refugees from Nazi Germany and Today
School of Visual Arts, New York

Note: Attendees must provide proof of vaccination (including booster, if eligible) and advance Eventbrite registration. Presented by BFA Visual & Critical Studies, the SVA Honors Program, and The Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized, and Banned Art. In honor of The Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art's virtual exhibition “Identity, Art and Migration,” this panel discussion probes historical and all-too contemporary fault lines of persecution, migration, intolerance, cultural complexity and art. Historians, curators and artists come together to discuss the life and work of artists who were persecuted by the German Nazi regime and came to the US during the first half of the 20th century, while also hearing from living artists who are facing the challenge of relocation [...]

Apr 6, 2022

Ben-Zion (1897-1987):
Man of Many Faces
Featuring Tabita Shalem and Ori Z Soltes

Rachel Stern2022-04-06T15:57:51-04:00April 6th, 2022|Events, Lectures, Past Events|Comments Off on Ben-Zion (1897-1987):
Man of Many Faces
Featuring Tabita Shalem and Ori Z Soltes

Born in the Russian Empire, Ben-Zion (Benzion Weinman, 1897-1987) immigrated to New York City between the wars, arriving as a craftsman of words whose cultural Zionist convictions led him to write his poetry in Hebrew. By the early 1930s, the rise of fascism and its particularized manipulations of language drove him to despair of the power of words and to turn to visual art as a medium of expression. Endlessly creative, across the next six decades he produced a flood of drawings and oil paintings and sculptures often made by re-visioning found objects of wood, stone, and iron. As a founding member of the expressionist group, "The Ten"--that included among others a young Mark Rothko--Ben-Zion addressed social, political, and cultural [...]