{"id":90829,"date":"2024-07-09T06:45:14","date_gmt":"2024-07-09T06:45:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/09\/crown-jewels-of-the-jewish-people-preserving-memories-of-the-holocaust\/"},"modified":"2024-07-09T06:45:14","modified_gmt":"2024-07-09T06:45:14","slug":"crown-jewels-of-the-jewish-people-preserving-memories-of-the-holocaust","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/09\/crown-jewels-of-the-jewish-people-preserving-memories-of-the-holocaust\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Crown Jewels of the Jewish People\u2019: Preserving Memories of the Holocaust"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1050\" height=\"550\" src=\"https:\/\/i2.wp.com\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/07\/07\/multimedia\/xxisrael-yadvashem-01-pwtb\/xxisrael-yadvashem-01-pwtb-facebookJumbo.jpg?resize=1050,550&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"\u2018Crown Jewels of the Jewish People\u2019: Preserving Memories of the Holocaust\" title=\"\u2018Crown Jewels of the Jewish People\u2019: Preserving Memories of the Holocaust\" \/><\/div><p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The pictures are haunting: black-and-white prints of a snow-covered barracks and paintings bordered by wire fences and skeletal trees, grim depictions of a World War II camp in France where Jews were interned before being transported to concentration camps.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The artist, Jacques Gotko, created one picture using a background of crushed eggshells glued to a wooden board; for others he used a piece of old tire as a printing block. Those were just some of the few materials available to him at the camp where he was held before being transported to Drancy, another camp in France, then Auschwitz-Birkenau, in Poland, in 1943.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Fragile and rarely displayed, these works are part of a massive repository of Holocaust-related artifacts \u2014 among them millions of pages of documents, tens of thousands of pages of testimony, artworks and personal belongings and more than half a million photographs \u2014 collected over the years by Yad Vashem, Israel\u2019s official Holocaust memorial in Jerusalem.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Most of the artifacts had been scattered around Yad Vashem\u2019s vast campus, but they will now be housed in a new center that will allow easier access for researchers and provide the most advanced technological conditions to safeguard them for future generations. The center was recently completed and was inaugurated Monday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The task of preserving the artifacts has become all the more urgent as the Holocaust becomes an ever more distant episode, with the number of survivors steadily decreasing, at a time when antisemitism and extremism are resurgent around the world, Yad Vashem officials say.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThese are the crown jewels of the Jewish people,\u201d Dani Dayan, the chairman of Yad Vashem, said of the collections. \u201cThere is no Judaism without historical remembrance.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The new David and Fela Shapell Family Collections Center is opposite the Hall of Remembrance, which was established more than six decades ago at the core of the campus, and where an eternal flame burns above a stone crypt containing the ashes of Holocaust victims from extermination camps in Europe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">It is mostly subterranean, reaching five stories underground, blending in with the landscape and housing the artifacts in a protected space.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">More than 150 staff members will be working at the site, gathering more names of victims and artifacts, and conserving and cataloging the objects. A video installation along the wall of the entrance hall runs in a 44-minute loop showing thousands of fragments of documents and objects kept in the center\u2019s vaults.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cWe are not looking for a Mona Lisa,\u201d said Medy Shvide, the director of the Yad Vashem archives, museums and collections. \u201cWe look for things that tell the story of the people of the time \u2014 who was this family, and what happened to them.\u201d Those remnants, or clues, could be as seemingly unremarkable as a hairbrush or a glove.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">State-of-the-art labs are upgrading the process of digitizing and treating documents and other paper artifacts; textiles, such as decorative ritual garments; and oil paintings. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Many objects are not restored to their former state, intentionally. Yad Vashem\u2019s curators say the imperfections, or damage such as charring from a fire, can often best convey the stories of the Jewish communities decimated in the Holocaust, of Jewish life before World War II or of survivors.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The art collection is housed in a vault with an oxygen-reduced atmosphere for fire prevention. Most of the works created during the Holocaust were on paper and are kept in boxes. Many are not by famous artists. \u201cIt is our duty to commemorate them,\u201d said Eliad Moreh-Rosenberg, Yad Vashem\u2019s art collections director, otherwise, \u201cthey will be forgotten.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Some of the works in the art vault will go on display as part of a rotating exhibit in Yad Vashem\u2019s gallery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Since the Hamas-led assault on southern Israel on Oct. 7, Israelis have been wrestling with a new tragedy and questions of remembrance and commemoration. About 1,200 people were killed that day, most of them civilians, according to the Israeli authorities, making it the deadliest single day for Jews since the Holocaust.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Yad Vashem\u2019s mission is to emphasize the uniqueness of the Holocaust as a singular historical event and educate the world about it. Mr. Dayan, the chairman, takes issue with direct comparisons between the terrorism of Oct. 7 and the Nazi genocide and says a distinction must be made.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cOct. 7 was not the Shoah,\u201d he said, referring to the Holocaust by its Hebrew name, adding that modern Israel has a strong army that can exact a toll from its enemies.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Still, he said, for many people the associations were inescapable: Mothers muffling their infants \u2014 trying to keep them quiet while hiding in their safe rooms as gunmen hunted them down and set their homes ablaze \u2014 recalled Jews hiding from the Nazis in barns, basements or attics in Europe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In the years before the assault of Oct. 7, antisemitic incidents had been on the rise around the world. The <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2018\/10\/27\/us\/active-shooter-pittsburgh-synagogue-shooting.html?searchResultPosition=7\" title=\"\">shooting<\/a> in October 2018 at a synagogue in Pittsburgh in which 11 worshipers were killed was the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history.<span class=\"css-8l6xbc evw5hdy0\">  <\/span>In Europe, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2021\/05\/19\/world\/middleeast\/israel-palestinians-anti-semitism-europe.html?searchResultPosition=3\" title=\"\">synagogues in Germany and France<\/a> were targeted in attacks, sometimes fueled by anger over strife between Israel and the Palestinians.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">After the Oct. 7 assault, Israel\u2019s devastating offensive in Gaza unleashed mass protests in foreign capitals and on college campuses, at times with antisemitic overtones.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Israel has found itself accused of genocide against Palestinians in Gaza \u2014 where more than 38,000 people have been killed in the war, according to Gaza health officials, who do not distinguish between civilian and combatant deaths. Israel denies committing genocide.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">For Mr. Dayan, preserving the Yad Vashem collections is crucial to building a solid, authoritative foundation of evidence, data and knowledge to counter Holocaust deniers and distorters as the aging generation of Holocaust survivors dies out.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">That means commemorating artists whose creations came to stand as their last wills and testaments \u2014 like Jacques Gotko, who died of typhus in Auschwitz-Birkenau, he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Using the scrap of tire, Gotko created a series of linocut-style prints of the barracks where Jews were kept at the Nazi transit camp at Compi\u00e8gne, in France. The signed works are numbered and labeled Front Stalag 122, as the camp was designated, and dated 1942.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Born Jakow Gotkowski in Odesa, in what is now Ukraine, Gotko moved to Paris in 1905 as a child with his family. He studied at the \u00c9cole des Beaux-Arts, and his paintings were exhibited in prestigious Parisian art salons.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">He continued painting after he was taken with other Jews to the transit camp in 1941. In the camp, a still life that is being stored in the new facility was among his creations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">In a twist on the traditions of the old masters, instead of sumptuous displays of exotic fruit and vivid flowers, the still life he painted featured a crust of bread, a spoon, a tin cup and a matchbox. His backdrop was a wire fence and trees, some bare and skeletal, some with leaves, in the world beyond the camp.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Dayan has a quotation etched on the wall of his office written by Gela Seksztajn, a Polish artist who died in the Warsaw Ghetto. Knowing that she was doomed, she wrote: \u201cMy works I bequeath to the Jewish museum to be built after the war.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Many of her works were hidden in a secret archive in the ghetto and survived the war. Most are now kept in the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw. A few are in the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington and one is in Yad Vashem.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cWe are approaching a watershed moment in Holocaust remembrance,\u201d Mr. Dayan said. \u201cWe are entering the post-survivor era where we are going to be the messengers.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2024\/07\/09\/world\/middleeast\/israel-holocaust-yad-vashem.html\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The pictures are haunting: black-and-white prints of a snow-covered barracks and paintings bordered by wire fences and skeletal trees, grim depictions of a World War II camp in France where Jews were interned before being transported to concentration camps. The artist, Jacques Gotko, created one picture using a background of crushed eggshells glued to a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":90830,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/static01.nyt.com\/images\/2024\/07\/07\/multimedia\/xxisrael-yadvashem-01-pwtb\/xxisrael-yadvashem-01-pwtb-facebookJumbo.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[30501,5402,76562,9049,17011,124,78074],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90829"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90829"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90829\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90831,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90829\/revisions\/90831"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}