2020 Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Conference: Art and the Holocaust with Eliad Moreh Rosenberg

The Museum is proud to present the 2020 Fanya Gottesfeld Heller Conference for Educators. This year’s focus, presented in three parts, is on Art and the Holocaust. Just as every Holocaust survivor’s testimony is unique, so too is art produced during the Holocaust. It is a miracle that any artwork survived. Artwork asserts the artist’s humanity and individuality, qualities too often overshadowed by photographs taken by the Nazis or their collaborators. Artists documented the Holocaust as it unfolded around them, trying to leave documentation for future generations. When the war ended, many survivor artists continued to produce art relating to their experiences. In the decades since, among children and grandchildren of survivors were also artists who explored their relationship to their survivor relatives and the Holocaust through art. With the development of computer capabilities, video, and the growing popularity of graphic novels, new arenas for artistic expression opened up.