{
"id": "p16022coll217:11",
"object": "https://cdm16022.contentdm.oclc.org/utils/getthumbnail/collection/p16022coll217/id/11",
"set_spec": "p16022coll217",
"collection_name": "Fritz Hirschberger - The Sur-Rational Holocaust Paintings",
"collection_name_s": "Fritz Hirschberger - The Sur-Rational Holocaust Paintings",
"collection_description": "Fritz Hirschberger, a Holocaust survivor, invokes the religious art of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and draws from texts, historical narratives, and testimony in developing the content of the paintings.\n
\nThe Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (CHGS) is a research center at the University of Minnesota that promotes academic research, education and public awareness on the Shoah, other genocides and current forms of mass violence. From its founding in 1997, a major focus of CHGS has been the study and exhibition of artistic responses to mass atrocities as a means to foster remembrance and education.",
"title": "The Hypocritical Oath",
"title_s": "The Hypocritical Oath",
"title_t": "The Hypocritical Oath",
"title_search": "The Hypocritical Oath",
"title_sort": "thehypocriticaloath",
"description": "The image refers to the medical experimentation done on inmates at various concentration camps. The most infamous experiments were at Dachau (hypothermia and high-altitude experiments), Dr. Mengele’s lethal experiments on twins at Auschwitz and simulated gunshot experiments on women at Ravensbruck. The paradox of the Nazi era was that an order from Goering in October, 1933, prohibited experimentation on animals. The painting is linked to Rembrandt’s famous group portrait of Amsterdam Surgeon’s Guild, The Anatomy Lesson of Dr, Tulp (1632).",
"date_created": [
"1990?"
],
"date_created_ss": [
"1990?"
],
"date_created_sort": "1990",
"creator": [
"Hirschberger, Fritz, 1912-2004"
],
"creator_ss": [
"Hirschberger, Fritz, 1912-2004"
],
"creator_sort": "hirschbergerfritz19122004",
"caption": "The Nazi Doctors, 50% of all the doctors in Germany by 1944, did not take the Hippocratic oath, but swore allegiance to the Reich and to the protection of Aryan blood.",
"notes": "Survivors share a special vision of having been victims of the Holocaust. Non-survivors cannot possess the same vision. Survivors possess memories that others can comprehend only in indirect ways. In some respect, the only “authentic” Holocaust art may be said to be the art of the survivors. Fritz Hirschberger’s Sur-Rational Paintings fit into this category. The paintings represent an attempt by Hirschberger as survivor and Jew to depict his impression of historical events and his own emotional and frequently cynical responses to the Holocaust. Hirschberger described himself as a historian who paints history. He created his paintings based on his wartime experiences and research. He spoke with survivors, read testimonies, documents and historical accounts. After gaining such knowledge he created works borrowing technique, symbols and colors associated with the religious art of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. He invokes works by the painters he admired including; Giotto, Durer, Rembrandt, German Expressionists and many others. The idea of combining the content of the paintings with text is based on the medieval German Moritat (song), meaning a song of Mori (deadly) and Tat ( deed). The lyrics of the Moritat were usually based on a heinous crime and performed by strolling minstrels in combination with illustrations painted on a banner. In April of 1990 the original paintings for the series were destroyed in an arson fire in his studio. Repainting, Hirschberger developed a specific oil base that permits multiple applications to give the paintings a luminous quality that one associates with the paintings of the Renaissance. Hirschberger was clear in his vision for the viewer of these works. He carefully considered the historic brutality of man against man-the Holocaust as the ultimate extreme. As he said on several occasions. “If you do not like the content of my paintings then don’t make the history and I won’t have to paint it.”; Fritz Hirschberger was born in Dresden, Germany, in 1912. His father came from the Austrian partition lands of Poland in Galicia, and his mother from Bohemia. Both were Jewish. Hirschberger received a traditional liberal arts education in 1930's Dresden. During his studies he developed affection for the painting of the Renaissance, especially the works of Giotto and Dürer, as well as the German Expressionists of the 1920’s. In 1938, Hirschberger and his family were arrested by the Gestapo, as Polish-Jewish aliens and expelled to Poland, his father’s native land. His family was forced at gunpoint by armed SS men to cross the border into Poland. In September 1939 Hirschberger fought in the Polish Army against the invading Nazis. After the defeat of Poland on September 15, his regiment no longer existed and he fled into the Soviet Occupied Zone. Here, Hirschberger was arrested by NKVD the Soviet Secret Police for being a member of the Zionist organization the Betar. Subsequently he was sentenced to 21 years and shipped to a slave labor camp in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Komi, behind the Polar Circle. On June 22, 1941 Germany invaded the Soviet Union. As a result the Soviets joined the Allies to fight against the German’s. Hirschberger, at the time was considered a political prisoner and set free to either fight in the Polish “Anders” Army or Soviet forces. Hirschberger fought with the Ander’s Army in North Africa against General Erwin Rommel and participated in the Battle of Monte Cassino in Italy. After the war Hirschberger, discovered that his father had been killed at the Dora labor camp during the Holocaust but that his fiancée Gisela was alive and living in England. The Hirschberger’s came to America in 1948, settling in New York where he worked with various artists at the New School on 12th Street. In 1984 he and his family moved to San Francisco where he lived until his death on January 8, 2004.",
"types": [
"Still Image"
],
"format": [
"Paintings (visual works) | http://vocab.getty.edu/aat/300033618"
],
"format_name": [
"Paintings (visual works)"
],
"dimensions": "40 inches x 60 inches",
"subject": [
"Holocaust",
"Artistic Response",
"Survivor",
"Nazis",
"Doctors",
"Medical Experiments"
],
"subject_ss": [
"Holocaust",
"Artistic Response",
"Survivor",
"Nazis",
"Doctors",
"Medical Experiments"
],
"contributing_organization": "University of Minnesota, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.",
"contributing_organization_name": "University of Minnesota, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.",
"contributing_organization_name_s": "University of Minnesota, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies.",
"contact_information": "University of Minnesota, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 214 Social Sciences Building, 267 19th Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55455; https://cla.umn.edu/chgs",
"dls_identifier": [
"1084457"
],
"persistent_url": "http://purl.umn.edu/225755",
"local_rights": "Use of this item may be governed by US and international copyright laws. You may be able to use this item, but copyright and other considerations may apply. For possible additional information or guidance on your use, please contact the contributing organization.",
"page_count": 0,
"record_type": "primary",
"first_viewer_type": "image",
"viewer_type": "image",
"attachment": "11.jp2",
"document_type": "item",
"featured_collection_order": 999,
"date_added": "2017-12-15T00:00:00Z",
"date_added_sort": "2017-12-15T00:00:00Z",
"date_modified": "2018-07-30T00:00:00Z",
"_version_": 1710337844235468800,
"type": "Still Image",
"collection": "p16022coll217",
"is_compound": false,
"parent_id": "11",
"thumb_url": "https://cdm16022.contentdm.oclc.org/utils/getthumbnail/collection/p16022coll217/id/11",
"thumb_cdn_url": "https://dkp5i0hinw9br.cloudfront.net/5f56e81b9938d01ae8e161a1dbc87f7d82be9630.png",
"children": [
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}