Category Archives: Terezin Artists

Hedy Strnad: A Dressmaker Whose Designs Survived the Holocaust

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In 1997, a middle-aged Milwaukee man named Burton Strnad was cleaning out his mother’s basement when he made a remarkable discovery. In a dusty, unmarked box he found a large red envelope bearing a Nazi swastika stamp. He felt a chill as he slowly opened the envelope.

Inside he found a letter from his father’s cousin Paul Strnad, a black and white photograph of Paul and his wife, and eight beautifully illustrated dress designs in vibrant watercolors.

The date on the letter was December 11, 1939, and it was addressed to Burton’s father, Alvin. In his letter, Paul explained that he was desperately trying to leave Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia with his wife, who was unnamed in the letter.

And Paul believed that their last chance for escape rested on the talent of his wife, a highly esteemed dressmaker and designer in Prague. Paul sent eight of his wife’s designs to Alvin and asked him to try to find a job for his wife. If his wife could land a job as a designer or seamstress, Paul hoped that they would finally be able to secure visas to the United States. 

Burton’s father never mentioned the letter to him, and he didn’t know what had happened to Paul and his wife. Recognizing that he had uncovered a treasure, Burton donated
the letter and designs, along with the photo of Paul and his wife to the Jewish Museum Milwaukee. The museum displayed the vibrant drawings sketched by an
unnamed designer, which captivated countless visitors.

The museum staff also launched an ambitious project to uncover the identity of the woman who created these designs. Researchers from the museum scoured the Yad Vashem archives and finally discovered that her name was Hedwig Strnad.
They discovered that despite Alvin’s best efforts, securing visas for Paul and his
wife proved to be impossible.

Like so many Czech Jews, the couple was deported to Terezin, and later to the Warsaw Ghetto. It is certain they did not survive the war, and were most likely murdered in either the Warsaw Ghetto or the Treblinka death camp. Other than that, nothing else was known about them.

But during the course of their research, a museum intern managed to connect with one of the couple’s nieces who survived the Holocaust, Brigitte Rohaczek, who recalled a
few precious memories of her aunt. She remembered that her aunt was affectionately known as Hedy, had vibrant red hair, was always beautifully dressed, and enjoyed
smoking cigarettes. Brigitte also recalled that Hedy was kindhearted, always in a good mood, and had a wonderful sense of humor.

As these small details about Hedy emerged, the museum researchers and staff grew even more deeply invested in her story. And when a museum visitor suggested that they actually create Hedy’s designs, the staff decided to take action. 

The museum’s executive director, Kathy Bernstein, approached the head of the costume department of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater, who agreed to help bring
Hedy’s innovative and elegant designs to life.

Creating Hedy’s outfits was not a simple task, given that all the theater’s costume shop had to work from were two-dimensional images which gave no indication of the fabrics
or patterns. The costume team conducted meticulous research into the clothing of the time period in order to interpret Hedy’s designs as authentically as possible.

Piece by piece, each article of clothing emerged. A tailored violet coat with matching hat and shoes. A fitted turquoise day dress, a black dress with a pink rose pattern, and an airy, flowing ball gown. And each outfit was paired with custom accessories such as gloves, scarves, and fascinators. 

The team ensured that every detail was crafted with the utmost care, and even
created historically accurate labels that said “Hedy original”, which they sewed into
every dress and coat. All together, the process took about 3,000 hours and spanned
over 10 months. 

At last, Hedy’s designs were complete, and they were later featured in a traveling exhibit called Stitching History From the Holocaust, which opened at the Jewish Museum Milwaukee in 2014. Since then, the exhibit has traveled to many places throughout the United States, including the National Czech & Slovak Museum & Library (NCSML) in Cedar
Rapids, Iowa and the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Lower Manhattan.

The exhibit serves as a powerful tribute to Hedy Strnad, an incredibly talented designer who tragically never had the chance to bring her vision to life. And Hedy’s story forces us to acknowledge the countless people who died in the Holocaust whose unique talents and gifts the world never saw, whose cherished hopes and dreams were never realized. 

Gertrud Kauders: A Long-Lost Terezin Artist

Terezin Artists

Few people knew about Gertrud Kauders until 2018, when workers in the process of demolishing an old house in Prague made a remarkable discovery.

It seemed to be a routine construction job, until one of the workers began tearing down a wall and nearly 30 paintings tumbled out. A collection of Impressionist portraits, landscapes, still lifes.  Someone had removed the canvases from their frames and stashed them in the wall of this house. 

As the demolition continued, more hidden canvases emerged from the walls and from underneath the floorboards. Eventually, the workers unearthed close to 700 paintings, all in perfect condition after many years. 

And all of these canvases bore the signature of an artist from Prague named Gertrud Kauders. 

The Life of Gertrud Kauders

Gertrud Kauders was born in Prague in 1883, into a middle-class German-speaking Jewish family. A talented artist, Gertrud studied under the well-known Czech artist Otakar Nejedlý at Prague’s Academy of Fine Arts. As a student, Gertrud had the opportunity to spend her summers in France and Italy. There she spent hours painting the iconic cities and landscapes she saw. She developed her own distinctive style, which bore resemblances to Impressionism, with softly defined forms and vibrant, yet muted tones. 

When the Nazis came to power in Germany and turned their attention on Czechoslovakia, most of Gertrud’s family managed to escape the country. Although they begged her to come with them, she didn’t believe the Nazis would target her, as a native German speaker. And so she stayed behind. 

But the Nazis quickly began to persecute the country’s Jews, and Gertrud realized that she didn’t have much time left. And so she and her close friend Natalie Jahudkova, who’d studied with her at the Academy of Fine Arts, devised a plan to save her artwork from the Nazis.

Gertrud removed all her canvases from their frames and smuggled them to Natalie’s house in the Prague suburb of Zbraslav. The two women then managed to hide the canvases in the walls and floorboards of the home, without anyone else knowing about it.  And there they remained for nearly 80 years. 

Sadly, Gertrud was arrested by the Nazis in May 1942 and sent to Terezin soon after hiding away her paintings. If she had been able to stay in Terezin, she would have undoubtedly found a way to continue her art despite the terrible conditions there. But tragically, Gertrud never had the chance. 

She was only in Terezin a couple of weeks before she was transported to a death camp in Poland called Majdanek. There she was murdered shortly after arrival, sometime around May 17, 1942.

The Rediscovery of Gertrud Kauders’ Paintings

Natalie Jahudkova kept the paintings hidden in her home and kept this secret for the rest of her life. She died in 1977, and left the house to a woman she’d unofficially adopted in the 1920s. In 2018, this woman’s grandson, Jakub Sedlacek, decided to tear down the abandoned and broken-down house. It was during this demolition that Gertrud’s paintings resurfaced. 

After seeing reports of the find in the media, Gertrud’s niece Miriam Kauders managed to locate the paintings. While they don’t have a permanent home yet, both Jakub and Miriam intend to donate most of the collection to a museum in Prague. And some of the portraits will be returned to Miriam and the surviving members of the Kauders family. They will serve as a memorial to Gertrud, the talented artist whose name is just now being rediscovered.

To view photos of some of Gertrud’s remarkable paintings, you can find them here. Hopefully the day will come soon when her paintings are displayed to the world once again. 

Teaching Helga’s Diary Through Her Paintings

Children in Terezin, Terezin Artists, Terezin Writers, ,

Helga Weiss was a young Terezin artist whose story has become known in the past few years with the publication of her diary. Helga’s diary and paintings give us valuable written and artistic testimony of the Holocaust through the eyes of a young girl. Helga’s paintings are an excellent resource for teaching students the Holocaust.

Here is a guide on how to introduce students to Helga’s world using a selection of her paintings. The paintings can be used before teaching Helga’s diary, or as a more general introduction to the Holocaust.

Selecting the Paintings

Helga created dozens of paintings that you can choose from. I recommend choosing from the selection of her paintings profiled on The Guardian. Here are some of the ones I suggest showing your students:

  • List of Possessions, January 1943
    Helga’s parents take an inventory of all their possessions to hand over to the Nazis.
  • Arrival in Terezin, 1942
    A group of Jewish prisoners walks into Terezin with their luggage as a guard watches them closely.
  • The Dormitory in the Barracks at Terezin, 1942
    A scene of the room Helga and her mother shared with 21 other women.
  • Summons to Join the Transport, 24 February 1942
    A girl sits up in her dark bunk as a flashlight shines on her. Helga wrote that the summons to join the transports often happened at night.
  • For Her 14th Birthday, November 1943
    A painting Helga made as a birthday gift for her best friend Francka. Sadly, Francka was murdered in Auschwitz before her 15th birthday.

Observe the Paintings

Show your students Helga’s paintings and tell them it depicts a scene from daily life in the Terezin ghetto during World War II. You can project the image in front of the class, or you could hand out copies of the paintings to your students. A large color image is best so students can see the color of the paints Helga used.

Give your students the chance to take a long look at each painting and to note the details. Encourage them to notice the colors, the shapes, what the people in the painting are doing, and the expressions on their faces. Ask them what they observe, and write down the observations on the classroom whiteboard. At this point, the class should just observe the details, not interpret or analyze anything.

Ask your students what questions they have about the painting. Give them a few minutes to write down as many questions as they can. Once the time is up, divide your class into small groups and instruct them to come up with some answers to their questions.

Analyze the Paintings

Now ask your students to think about the artist herself. How old is she, and why is she painting scenes of life in the Terezin ghetto? What was it like for her to live in the ghetto? Who is her audience, and why is she painting for them? Have the students write down their thoughts and ask for volunteers to share with the class.

After you hear your students’ input, introduce them to Helga Weiss, a twelve-year-old girl from Prague who was sent to Terezin with her parents in 1941. Tell them how she and her mother were separated from her father, and how she decided to send her father a painting to cheer him up. She painted a happy scene of two children building a snowman, but her father surprised her with his reaction. He wrote her a letter telling her “Draw what you see!”.

Ask your students to think about why her father wanted her to record life in the ghetto. Now have them look at the painting again and draw their attention to specific details. Emphasize that each detail is depicting something that the artist Helga actually observed in Terezin. Ask them to put themselves in the scene and to imagine it unfolding around them. How does it make them feel? How do they think Helga would have felt as she drew the scene?

This is one idea for presenting Helga’s paintings to your class in a meaningful way that can help them to feel more invested in her story. A big part of teaching the Holocaust effectively is presenting it in a way that students can engage with, and helping them feel a personal connection with someone who experienced it.

6 Essential Holocaust Teaching Resources for Middle School Students

Children in Terezin, Terezin Artists, Terezin Musicians, Terezin storytellers, Terezin Writers, , , , , ,

While there are plenty of Holocaust teaching resources for middle school
students, teaching the Holocaust to this age group is still very challenging.
How do you make the Holocaust relevant to them? And what are some
ways to guide them through this incredibly upsetting subject?

Here is a list of six resources that can help you teach middle schoolers about the Holocaust.

The Butterfly Project

This incredible project uses the arts to educate students about the dangers of intolerance. It makes the Holocaust accessible to children, and presents the subject matter in a way that is poignant but not overly graphic or frightening.

The way it works is as follows: schools order kits containing ceramic butterflies, painting supplies, and cards with biographies of children who died in the Holocaust. After learning more about the children, each student receives a butterfly to paint in memory of them. The school or a community center then install the butterflies as a permanent memorial to the children who died in the Holocaust. The hope is one day there will be 1.5 million butterflies on display around the world, one for each Jewish child the world lost.

Visit their website to learn more about The Butterfly Project or to order a kit.

Inge Auerbacher’s I Am a Star

I Am a Star: Child of the Holocaust tells the story of Inge Auerbacher, a young girl
who survived the war in Terezin. The book is a compelling way to bring the Holocaust to life for your middle school students. Inge is the author of several best selling
books, including I Am a Star, which details her childhood and her time in Terezin.
The book can be purchased on Amazon or through the publisher’s website.

I Am a Star is available in many languages and a 30th-anniversary edition was
recently released. The book was also adapted into an award-winning play, “The Star on
My Heart”, which premiered in Ohio in 2015. Her story has also been featured on Butterflies in the Ghetto.

Paper Clips

This documentary tells the story of a Holocaust memorial project started by teachers and middle school students in the small town of Whitwell, Tennessee.

As part of a Holocaust education project the students began collecting paper clips. Their goal was to acquire 1.5 million to represent each child lost in the Holocaust. The project took off and ultimately the entire community created a remarkable Holocaust memorial outside the school.

The Whitwell community built the memorial in an authentic cattle car from Germany. The result is a starkly beautiful memorial to the children of the Holocaust, and a
powerful message about tolerance and acceptance of others.

Brundibár

Composer Hans Krása and librettist Adolf Hoffmeister created the children’s opera in 1938. Incredibly, Krása was able to stage a production of the musical in Terezin.

The musical was later performed when the Red Cross visited Terezin and featured in a Nazi propaganda film. Tragically, Krása and most of the child performers were later sent to Auschwitz. Very few of them survived the war.

In more recent years, the children’s opera has become more popular. It is certainly a great play to bring to a middle school if possible. There are also videos of the production on YouTube that are worth viewing and discussing with your class. An audio CD of the opera called Hans Krasa: Brundibar is available as well.

Vedem

Vedem is a literary magazine produced by the teenage boys of barrack L417 in Terezin. Fourteen-year-old Petr Ginz established the magazine, and he published a new
issue almost every week. Petr created much of the content himself and the other
boys contributed to it as well.

The magazine featured pieces on daily life in Terezin, satirical essays, poems, and
short fiction, as well as artwork. Tragically, Petr and most of the other boys from barrack L417 died in Auschwitz.

Their legacy lives on in the writings and drawings they left behind. You can read more about Petr Ginz and Vedem here.

I have also created a free Vedem study guide for teachers. The guide is available to
all subscribers to Butterflies In the Ghetto.

Nesarim: Child Survivors of Terezin

This powerful book relates the experiences of 10 boys who were imprisoned in Terezin, in their own words. The book was written by Thelma Gruenbaum, whose husband Michael was in Terezin and whose story is also detailed in the memoir Somewhere There is Still a Sun. 

In Terezin, these young boys shared a room with 30 other boys and developed
an incredibly strong bond with one another. They called themselves the
Nesarim, which means “eagles” in Hebrew, and the surviving Nesarim remained
in contact with one another throughout the years. 

This book gives readers a sense of what life was like for children in Terezin and preserves the voices of these child survivors so that children of today and future generations can hear and remember their stories. 

These are just a handful of resources teachers can use to help their middle school students better understand the Holocaust. I’ve found these to be particularly powerful in bringing stories from the Holocaust to light.

Have you used any of these in your teaching, and what have you found to be helpful? Please let me know in the comments below.

Dr. Karel Fleischmann: The Story of a Terezin Doctor and Artist

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Dr. Karel Fleischmann was a man whose talents were multifaceted, and whose humanity and compassion prevailed even in Terezin. He was an accomplished medical doctor, a dermatologist, who also painted in watercolor and wrote literary fiction.

He was born in 1897 in Klatovy, Bohemia, educated in Bohemia, and established his dermatology practice in Ceske Budejovice. He had a creative drive that the practice of medicine could not satisfy, and also painted watercolors, published collections of woodcuts and wrote short stories and poetry. His father was a graphic artist and calligrapher, and was always encouraging of his son’s artistic talents.

In 1939, after the Nazis occupied Czechoslovakia, Dr. Fleischmann was forced to stop practicing medicine. In April 1942, he and his wife were sent to Terezin, where he became one of the remarkable ghetto doctors who struggled to treat patients in spite of overcrowding, little hygiene, malnutrition and lack of both medicines and equipment. Despite their best efforts, it is estimated that around 130 people died each day.

Dr. Fleischmann became one of the directors of health at Terezin, doing all he could to reduce the mortality rate and care for the elderly patients. He was described as outgoing, good-natured and always ready to help others. He used his medical skills to treat patients in Terezin, and some of his patients who survived remembered him making his rounds with a scuffed black bag, and how his gentle sense of humor and compassion comforted them.

While he cared for patients and gave medical lectures at Terezin, the doctor was also secretly documenting the realities of camp life in a series of paintings, portraits, drawings and writings. He was also known for his lectures about medicine and art in the ghetto.

One of his most stark and poignant drawings is known as The First Night of New Arrivals and depicts elderly Jews arriving at Terezin and finding that they had been deceived. These new arrivals had been told that they were being taken to a retirement community in the mountains, and some were even forced to pay the Nazis for their new accommodations. These new prisoners sit on their suitcases, with looks of despair, shocked and horrified at the truth of their situation.

Images of the ever-present hearse are prevalent as well, as they were the only vehicles for transport in Terezin, and had to be used for moving essential supplies as well as sick and dying people.

Dr. Fleischmann also produced stunning, stark portraits of other people in Terezin. He painted his subjects with thick dark, brushstrokes, the lines taking on an almost caricature like quality. The faces of his subjects are especially noteworthy, as he conveys personality and emotion with seemingly simple brushstrokes.

Tragically, the doctor’s medical skills and highly developed artistic talents were not enough to save him. Dr. Fleischmann and his wife were sent to Auschwitz in October 1944 on one of the last transports from Terezin. During the selection at Auschwitz, the SS officer noticed that one of Dr. Fleischmann’s shoulders was slightly misshapen and lower than the other, and decided the doctor was unfit to work. Immediately after their arrival at Auschwitz, Dr. Fleischmann and his wife were sent to the gas chambers.

Dr. Fleischmann’s legacy lives on through his artwork and writings, which were hidden at Terezin and recovered after the war, and in the memories of the Terezin survivors who he treated and comforted against all odds.

Further Reading

The Artists of Terezin by Gerald Green

http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/last_portrait/fleischmann.asp

http://art.holocaust-education.net/explore.asp?langid=1&submenu=200&id=13

http://www.yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Fleischmann_Karel

Hana Brady and the Long-Lost Suitcase

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Hana Brady’s story became known to the world through an incredible turn of events. The story involves a battered suitcase with a few words painted on it: Hana Brady, born May 16, 1931, Orphan. Who was the young girl who owned this suitcase? Thanks to the efforts of Fumiko Ishioka, director of the Tokyo Holocaust Education Resource Center, we now have the answer. Here is Hana’s story.

Hana Brady as a child. Used with permission of George and Lara Brady.

Hana lived with her parents and older brother George in a small Czech town called Nové Město na Moravě. She was described as a happy, active and athletic little girl who was very close to her family. Hana was just eight years old when the Nazis occupied Czechoslovakia. The family’s life became restricted, and they were forced to hand over their radio and other valuables to the Nazis. Their Christian friends stopped playing with them, because their parents feared they would be punished for playing with Jewish children. Hana and George remained close and supported one another during this time.

In March 1941, their mother, Marketa, was assigned to a Nazi transport and taken away. Soon after, they were forced to sew yellow star badges to their clothing along with all the other Czech Jews. When one man in
town refused to comply, a Nazi officer was furious and
ordered the arrests of all the other Jewish men in town. Hana and George’s
father Karel was arrested and taken away a few days later, and the two children
were left with the family’s housekeeper.

Later that day, their uncle Ludvik, a Christian man married to their father’s sister
Hedda, arrived at the house. He had heard the bad news, and came to bring the
children to his home. He helped the children pack, and Hana gathered her
belongings in a large brown suitcase with a polka dot lining.

The children remained with their aunt and uncle until May 1942. That was when
the children received a notice ordering them to report to a deportation center.
They were taken to the center, where they were forced into a large warehouse
with hundreds of other Jewish families. After four days in the warehouse, they were
put on a train and sent to Terezin.

George as a child. Used with permission from George and Lara Brady.

The train stopped at Bohusovic Station, and Hana, George and the others on their transport had to carry their luggage the last few kilometers to Terezin. The children were
separated into homes, and Hana was assigned to the girls’ home in barrack L410. She slept on a thin burlap mattress on a three-level bunk bed and was initially confined to the barrack due to her age.

Hana was unable to see George and missed her brother terribly. Some of the older girls looked out for her, and she became friends with one of them, a dark-haired girl named Ella.

Hana spent her days with the room supervisor and the younger girls, doing chores and attending secret classes in the barrack. They learned songs in music class, the basics of sewing, and art. Hana’s favorite class was art, and she adored her teacher, famous artist Friedl Dicker-Brandeis. Hana produced many drawings, some of which still survive.

One of Hana’s drawings from Terezin. Used with permission of George and Lara Brady.

After she had been in Terezin for some time, the rules were changed and Hana was finally able to see her brother, who was assigned to the boys’ home in Barrack L417 and was working as a plumber in the camp. The siblings would see each other every chance they could get, and George was determined to do everything possible to take care of his sister. Hana in turn worried about George, and she would set aside her weekly buchta (a sort of plain doughnut) and give it to her brother to eat.

As the months went on, the camp became more and more cramped, and many people died from food shortages and epidemics. And every few weeks, people were assigned to transports heading East,
to some unknown destination.

In September 1944, George was sent away on one of these transports. A month later, Hana was assigned to a transport and was full of hope that she would be reunited with her brother. Hana’s friend Ella helped her to wash her face and hair, because Hana wanted to look nice when she saw her brother again.

The next morning, Hana, Ella and many other girls from their home were put on a dark train, which traveled nonstop for a day and a night. There was no food, no water, no toilet, and no way to know how long the journey was. Hana, Ella and the other girls held hands, whispered stories, imagined they were somewhere else.

On the night of October 23, 1944, they arrived at Auschwitz. The girls were forced out of the car, and ordered to stand on the platform. The guards selected a few of the older girls and sent them to the right.

Hana and the rest of the girls were told to drop their luggage and go to the left, where they were herded into a large warehouse. That night, Hana died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz at the age of thirteen.

George had also been sent to Auschwitz, but he managed to survive the camp, in part due to the plumbing skills he had gained at Terezin. He was liberated in January 1945 at the age of seventeen and returned to the home of his Uncle Ludvik and Aunt Hedda.

He learned that his parents were dead, and for many months searched for news of
his sister. Eventually, he met a teenage girl in Prague who knew Hana from Terezin,
and learned the horrible truth.

In 1951, George moved to Toronto and started a very successful plumbing
business, married and had three sons and a daughter. But despite all his joys
and successes, George’s loss of his parents and beloved sister was never far
from his mind.

Then, years later, in 2000, he received a letter from a woman named Fumiko Ishioka,
the director of a Holocaust Center in Tokyo. She had received a leather suitcase
with polka dot lining at her center – Hana’s suitcase.

Fumiko Ishioka. Used with permission of George and Lara Brady

Almost nothing was known of Hana, and after months of searching, Fumiko had found George and sent him a letter in the hopes of learning about his sister. Later, George and his daughter Lara traveled to the center in Tokyo to meet Fumiko and a group of schoolchildren known as the Small Wings, and to share Hana’s story.

In March 2004, George and Fumiko learned
that the suitcase was actually a replica created
by the museum at Auschwitz after the original suitcase and many other items from the Holocaust had been destroyed in a fire.

While saddened to hear about the fire, George and Fumiko were grateful that the Auschwitz museum created the replica, which brought them together and allowed them to bring Hana’s story to the world.

Further Reading

Hana’s Suitcase by Karen Levine

http://www.hanassuitcase.ca/?p=107

http://www.cbc.ca/hanassuitcase/

The Artists’ Affair Part 3: Bedřich Fritta

Children in Terezin, Terezin Artists, , , ,

Another remarkable artist who was incarcerated in Terezin was Bedřich Fritta, who was imprisoned along with Leo Haas and Otto Ungar in July 1944.

He was born Bedřich Taussig in 1906 in Weigsdorf (Višňová), Northern Bohemia and demonstrated an interest and aptitude for art. In 1930 he moved to Paris to study art, and eventually settled in Prague where he worked as a graphic designer, technical draughtsman and contributed cartoons and caricatures to satirical magazines. He preferred to be called Fritta, his pen name, and this is what he family and friends affectionately called him.

In December 1941 Fritta was sent to Terezin on one of the first transports along with other artists, engineers and doctors who were assigned to help set up the camp. His wife, Hansi, and their one year old son Tommy accompanied him to the camp.

At Terezin, Fritta was assigned as supervisor to the camp’s drawing studio, where blueprints, construction plans and technical reports were composed. Those who knew him described him as extroverted, outspoken, and strong-willed, a man of great enthusiasm. It seems that Fritta and Leo Haas were the ones who first used materials available to them to secretly depict life in the ghetto. Some of the other men who worked with them began to do the same.

In addition to his work at the camp, Fritta produced over 100 drawings and sketches in Terezin, most of which were ink drawings, finished with a paintbrush and water to add shadowy dimensions. His drawings are characterized by the interplay of light and shadow, and their haunted, despairing figures. Some of his sketches depict barracks, transports leaving the ghetto, the cafe set up in preparation for the Red Cross visit, in which solemn people sit at empty tables while a band plays.

Fritta also created a  picture book for his son Tommy, a gift for the boy’s third birthday on January 22, 1944. The book, which the artist bound with heavy brown paper, was filled with colorful ink, pen and watercolor drawings accompanied by captions. Fritta depicted Tommy’s daily activities, but also images of a happy life outside of Terezin. For Tommy’s third birthday, Fritta and his wife Hansi even managed to plan a special party in the ghetto, complete with presents and a cake.

Following the Red Cross visit, Fritta and Leo Haas hid many of their drawings and paintings, Haas in the paneling of a wall, Fritta in a large tin case that he and some of his friends secretly buried. Tommy’s book was hidden in the ghetto along with Fritta’s other paintings. Soon after the Red Cross visit, Fritta, his wife Hansi, and Tommy were imprisoned in the Small Fortress along with Leo Haas, Otto Ungar and their families.

Fritta endured unimaginable suffering while imprisoned,  and was savagely beaten and interrogated daily. He later contracted dysentery, which depleted all that remained of his strength. When he was moved to a cell occupied by Leo Haas, his friend was horrified at how emaciated and ill he had become. In early August both men were forced to sign an indictment stating that they were guilty of creating propaganda and distributing it abroad.

The following day, they were put on a train to Auschwitz. Fritta was suffering from severe dysentery and malnutrition and was barely able to walk or move. When the group was suddenly forced off the cars at Dresden, Haas lifted his friend onto his back and carried him off the car and through the dark streets. After a check at Gestapo headquarters, the prisoners were sent on to Auschwitz, where Fritta was taken to the infirmary. The doctor tried to keep Fritta comfortable and Haas and other friends visited him and smuggled food. But at this point, Fritta was unable to eat, and drifted in and out of consciousness. The outgoing, enthusiastic, courageous man who risked so much to reveal the truth of Terezin died eight days after arriving in Auschwitz, in late August 1944.

The artists’ wives and children were imprisoned in the Small Fortress for more than a year. Fritta’s wife Hansi died of malnutrition and disease in Terezin a few months after her husband. Their son Tommy survived the war in Terezin, an orphan at just four years of age. He was adopted by Fritta’s friend Leo Haas and his wife Erna. Haas returned to Terezin to recover their hidden paintings as soon as he could, and was successfully able to reclaim the tin box with Fritta’s works. He returned the beautiful, lovingly crafted picture book to Tommy, his last gift from the father who adored him.

Exhibition of Fritta’s Drawings
http://www.jmberlin.de/fritta/en/index.php

Tommy’s Book:
http://www.jmberlin.de/fritta/en/bilderbuch-fuer-tommy.php

Further Reading
The Artists of Terezin by Gerald Green

The Artists’ Affair Part 2: Otto Ungar

Terezin Artists

Otto Ungar was another artist who along with Leo Haas, was interrogated, tortured and imprisoned in the Small Fortress for depicting the truth of Terezin. Far less is known about Ungar than Leo Haas, unfortunately. It is known that he lived for most of his life in the Czech city of Brno. Before the war, Ungar resided in Brno with his wife and daughter and was a teacher at a Jewish secondary school and an artist. He was described as a very reserved, sensitive and anxious man, which makes it all the more remarkable that he took tremendous risks by creating raw and brutally honest drawings of daily life in Terezin.

Ungar worked in the drafting office at Terezin, along with fellow artists Leo Haas and Bedrich Fritta. All three men were aware of the deception the Nazis were perpetrating at Terezin and sought to record the truth of what happened in the camp in sketches and paintings. Ungar secretly painted the arrival of transports (The Coming of a Transport), and the despair and suffering of elderly adults at Terezin, many of whom had been deceived and told they were being sent to a retirement community (Portrait of an Old Woman).

After being interrogated in July 1944, Otto Ungar was also imprisoned in the Small Fortress, where he endured daily beatings and torture by the prison guards. His right hand, the hand he drew with, was savagely broken by the guards. Two of his fingers had to be amputated as a result, and he lost the use of his hand.

Later that summer, Ungar was sent to Auschwitz, where he managed to survive the selection, despite his injuries. He remained there until January 1945, where he was forced on a death march across the frozen Polish countryside to the camp Buchenwald. Incredibly, Ungar survived the march despite being severely malnourished and ill with tuberculosis. He and the 14,000 other survivors were crammed into Buchenwald’s “Little Camp”, where a typhus epidemic raged. In these final terrible months of the war, in unspeakably horrific conditions, Otto Ungar did something remarkable. He scavenged scraps of paper and small pieces of coal, gripped the coal in his broken and mutilated right hand and slowly, painstakingly began to sketch his surroundings. Even after all the suffering and tortures he endured, despite his sensitive and anxious nature, he never lost his will to create, to reveal the truth. The Nazis could not break his resilient spirit, even though they broke so many others.

Otto Ungar survived the war and was liberated from Buchenwald in May 1945, but died a few months later in a hospital in Germany from complications of tuberculosis and typhus. His wife and daughter both survived the war in Terezin and returned to Brno.

The images that Ungar created in Buchenwald were lost, but many of the works he created in Terezin have survived. They remain today to show us the truth of Terezin and are the legacy of a gentle and sensitive soul that the Nazis could never break.

Further Reading

The Artists of Terezin by Gerald Green

The Artists’ Affair Part 1: Leo Haas

Terezin Artists, Terezin Musicians, Terezin storytellers, , , ,

On July 17th, 1944, a group of artists were summoned to the office of Terezin Commandant Karl Rahm. Their names were Leo Haas, Otto Ungar, Bedrich Fritta and Felix Bloch, and they worked in the drafting office at Terezin. Their crime: drawing and painting the true nature of the ghetto. They were interrogated by Rahm, and SS officers Captain Moes, Captain Hans Gunther and the infamous Colonel Adolf Eichmann. The officers wanted to know why the artists painted what they did, and accused them of being part of a Communist plot. The artists denied the Communist accusations, and stated that they simply drew and painted what they saw, the reality that surrounded them. The men were then brought to the damp cellar of a barrack, where they were again interrogated and questioned about their alleged Communist ties. Ultimately the officers stopped questioning them and transferred them and their families to the Small Fortress, where they endured more interrogations, beatings and torture.

Enrtance to the Small Fortress at Terezin

The interrogation and subsequent imprisonment of these men and their families in the Small Fortress of Terezin would come to be known as “The Artists’ Affair”. What follows are the stories of these men, beginning with Leo Haas, the one member of the group who survived the war.

Leo Haas was born in 1901 in Opava, Czechoslovakia and was interested in art from a young age, showing promise in painting and as a piano player. As a teenager, an art teacher recommended that he continue his art studies, and Leo moved to Karlsruhe, Germany to study at an art academy there. To fund his studies, Leo played the piano in local bars and restaurants – and painted the scenes he observed around him. In 1921 he moved to Berlin where his finished his studies and began working in a graphic design studio. He spend time in Paris and Vienna before marrying Sophie Hermann in 1929 and settling in his hometown of Opava. Haas became an established portrait painter and director of a local printing house, and was also known as a caricaturist.

Leo’s first encounter with the Nazis came in 1937, who declared his caricatures “degenerate” and “Communist”, which foreshadowed the events that would happen at Terezin. Haas, his second wife Erna, and her family were sent to Terezin at the end of September 1942. Haas was soon transferred to the graphic department of the ghetto, where his primary task was making architectural charts. Other well-known artists also worked in the department, including Otto Ungar and Bedřich Fritta, who would become a close friend of Haas. The men were often able to visit other parts of the ghetto, and they secretly began to paint and draw what they observed. Haas depicted transports, scenes from the ghetto café – where no food or drinks could be found, performances, bread rations being transported in a hearse, and many other aspects of life in the camp. He was known for being very politically minded, but known for his compassion and unflinching depictions of ghetto life in all its brutality.

He created a secret compartment in the paneling of the wall of his barrack where he hid many of his works. The works remained hidden during Haas’s interrogation and imprisonment in the Small Ghetto of Terezin, where Haas was sentenced to hard physical labor. After three and a half months, Haas and Fritta were again interrogated and accused of distributing Communist propaganda.

At the end of October they were sent to Auschwitz for their supposed crimes. Fritta was ill with dysentery and died a week later. Haas was soon transferred to another camp called Sachsenhausen where he was put to work in a counterfeiting unit due to his artistic talents. He was transferred twice more before being liberated by the Allies on May 5th, 1945. His wife survived the war but was in very poor health, and would remain sickly for the rest of her life. They adopted Fritta’s son Tomáš and moved to Prague, where they lived until Erna’s death in 1955. Haas then moved to East Berlin where he remarried, and worked as a caricaturist and cartoonist. He also exhibited his art around the world, up until his death in 1983.

Not long after the war, Haas bravely returned to Terezin in the hopes of recovering the paintings he had hidden in a wall panel of his barrack. He found all the paintings he had hidden there, as well as some of Fritta’s works, works of art that showed the world the truth of Terezin.

Further Reading
The Artists of Terezin by Gerald Green

http://art.holocaust-education.net/explore.asp?langid=1&submenu=200&id=14

http://www.theholocaustexplained.org/ks4/the-nazi-impact-on-europe/theresienstadt-a-case-study/leo-haas-living-culture-in-the-ghetto/#.WPPA3NLyvIU

http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/last_portrait/haas.asp

Alice Herz-Sommer: A Musician Until The End

Terezin Artists, Terezin Musicians, , , , , ,

Professional pianist and Terezin survivor Alice Herz-Sommer played her beloved aliceinstrument daily until her death at age 110 in 2014. She fell in love with the piano at an early age and her love for music quite literally kept her and her young son alive during the years they spent in Terezin. Alice, originally known as Aliza Herz, was born in Prague in 1903. She was a member of a well off German-speaking Jewish family, and her parents sponsored a cultural salon that attracted some of the most gifted minds of the time. Young Aliza met Franz Kafka, Sigmund Freud and Gustav Mahler, among other writers, intellectuals and composers. In time, she too would become a prominent pianist in her own right.

Alice first learned the piano as a child from her older sister, Irma, and even at a young age, was a dedicated pianist, practicing hours each day. A family friend and composer named Artur Schnabel expressed his belief that Alice was suited to be a professional musician. Alice later decided that this was the career she wanted and entered the Prague Conservatory of Music, where she was the youngest student in the school.
In 1931, at the age of 26, Alice married a businessman and musician named Leopold Sommer, and they had one son, Raphael. Alice established herself as a concert pianist and became known throughout Europe. She was forced to stop performing after the Nazis took control of Prague and forbade Jewish musicians to perform in concerts and music competitions.

Most of Alice’s family managed to flee to Palestine, but her elderly mother was unable to travel and Alice, her husband and Raphael stayed behind to help care for her. Alice’s mother was sent to Terezin in 1942, and Alice accompanied her to the train station. On this journey, Alice realized just how dire the situation had become, and she found solace in music, teaching herself the incredibly challenging 24 Etudes of Frederic Chopin, often up to eight hours a day.

In July 1943, Alice, along with her husband and son were sent to Terezin, where she performed in over 100 concerts. She continued to find strength in performing her music, which helped to free her from the daily horrors of life at Terezin. Alice also did all she could to provide stability for Raphael, and together they survived the war in Terezin. Alice’s husband and mother were transported to Nazi extermination camps and murdered, and Alice never learned the details of their final moments.

After the war, Alice and Raphael moved to Israel, where they reunited with their relatives. Alice continued to perform and taught at the Jerusalem Conservatory for 35 years, until she moved to London in 1986. Raphael also became a highly accomplished concert cellist, but he died tragically and suddenly in 2001. Alice continued to live on her own in a London apartment, where she continued to play the piano for hours each day, up until her death at age 110.

Alice’s life inspired several books and documentary films, most recently, The Lady in Number 6, which won an Oscar in 2013 for Best Short Documentary. The documentary, filmed about a year before Alice died, is a remarkable tribute. We hear Alice’s story in her own words and learn of her natural optimistic and joyful personality, which the Nazis failed to take from her. It was clear that her passion and love for music and her family were the driving forces in her life, and her ability to see the beauty in music and life is deeply moving, especially after all she endured at the hands of the Nazis. I encourage you to see this film, so that you may see for yourself this gifted, passionate, resilient woman named Alice Herz-Sommer.

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrXHcQyixTE