" Unspeakable " Artists as Witnesses to the Holocaust at Imperial War Museum

Friday, 05 September 2008 18:49

LONDON - Prompted by a number of remarkable recent acquisitions, "Unspeakable" is the first opportunity to see together the different artistic responses to the Nazi persecution of the Jews of Europe, from the Imperial War Museum’s Art collection.

The paintings of the British war artists who documented the aftermath of the liberation of camps are shown alongside the art produced by survivors, now living in this country, and a series of contemporary artists. On view 5 September through 31 August, 2009.

"Unspeakable" opens with Morris Kestleman’s 1943 painting Lama Sabachthani (Why have you forsaken me?), a rare British artistic response to news of the atrocities known to be taking place against the Jews in occupied Poland.

Following the liberation of Belsen in April 1945 British War Artists were brought into close contact with the stark realities of the Nazi concentration camps. Unspeakable will include work by Leslie Coles, Doris Zinkeisen, Eric Taylor and Mary Kessell who responded to the overwhelmingly distressing scenes with images that sought to convey detail and narrative.

At the end of the Second World War a number of Holocaust survivors revisited their experiences and memories through paintings and drawings. Survivors Alicia Melamed Adams, Roman Halter and Edith Birkin who settled in Britain after the war have created work that captures the ongoing legacy of loss, desperation and separation.

The exhibition will conclude with work by contemporary artists who have reacted to their own experience of Holocaust sites. These reactions, from artists a generation removed from the events, are exemplified by Darren Almond’s Border and Paul Ryan’s Concentrate.

The Imperial War Museum is unique in its coverage of conflicts, especially those involving Britain and the Commonwealth, from the First World War to the present day. It seeks to provide for, and to encourage, the study and understanding of the history of modern war and ‘war-time experience’. It is proud to be regarded as one of the essential sights of London. The Museum spans a huge range of activities not only at its main London location but also at its four further branches: the Churchill Museum and Cabinet War Rooms in Whitehall, the historic ship HMS Belfast, moored in the Pool of London, Imperial War Museum Duxford near Cambridge, and Imperial War Museum North in Trafford.