Kunst aus dem Holocaust | 100 Works from the Yad Vashem Collection

Art from the Holocaust | 100 Works from the Yad Vashem Collection

January 26 to April 3, 2016
Exhibition at the Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin

For the first time in Germany, the Deutsches Historisches Museum is exhibiting 100 works of art from Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center in Jerusalem. The exhibition, which was initiated by the German national daily BILD and is being held in collaboration with the Bonn-based Foundation for Art and Culture, is part of the official events surrounding the International Holocaust Remembrance Day and represents the culmination of events marking 50 years since the establishment of German-Israeli diplomatic relations. This is “hitherto the largest presentation of artworks from the Yad Vashem collection outside Israel, and should be cherished as an invaluable symbol of friendship,” said President of the Deutsches Historisches Museum, Alexander Koch.

The 100 works originate from the Jewish inmates of various concentration camps, labor camps and ghettos. “In these works that survived the Holocaust, we discern the power of art in revealing the personal perspectives of the Jewish victims,” explains Avner Shalev. “This exhibition allows for a rare encounter, specifically in Berlin, between contemporary spectators and those that lived through the events of the Shoah. Each work of art from our unique collection constitutes a living testimony from the Holocaust, as well as a declaration of the indomitable human spirit that refuses to surrender.” Created under inhumane conditions in the utmost secrecy, the largely graphical works attest to the power of the human spirit in the face of adversity and death, and to the conflict between the reality of the Holocaust and an imaginary counter-world. t.