Media Archive

More like this

Expert search

Why Did Birds of a Feather Flock Together?

view full size image | download reference image

Title

Why Did Birds of a Feather Flock Together?

Creators

Fritz Hirschberger

Date

c. 1990

Caption

Birds of a feather flock together, And so will pigs and swine; Rats and mice Will have their choice, And so will I have mine.

Description

"The Fifth Horseman Series" continues the work begun in Fritz Hisrchberger’s “Sur-Rational Holocaust Paintings” series, and should not be be seen as independent of one another. The exhibition draws its title from Hirschberger’s painting of the same name, which references the Book of Revelations (6:1-8):

“And now I saw a pale horse, and its rider's name was Death. And there followed after him another horse whose rider's name was Hell. They were given control of one-fourth of the earth, to kill with war and famine and disease and wild animals."

Hirschberger presents a Fifth Horseman, operating in the shadow of the Fourth. It was common belief, especially during the Reformation, that one could not defend oneself or one's faith against those things that one could not discern with their physical senses. The war that will be waged against a person by the Fifth Horseman will occur on a different plane. It is a plane that the physical senses are not able to discern. And despite this apparent handicap, the Fifth Horseman will not have pity on you, and will show mercy to none.

Hirschberger equates the Fifth Horseman to the Nazis whose methods and ideology defied rational thought, and created a scenario of Hell on earth for their victims in the form of the ghettos, slave-labor camps, extermination centers, and killing fields in the East. The Fifth Horseman series brings forth both Christian iconography from the Bible and plays on artistic themes and works from the Renaissance, while introducing us to symbols of death used by the Nazis for mass murder into this visual milieu.

Hirschberger offers commentary on these paintings in more depth than then with the Sur-Rational, driven by his research on the Holocaust. Though he is not a historian, he uses historical facts to more clearly communicate the meaning of his paintings.

Annotation

This painting is meant to remind the viewer of Eugene Delacroix's (1798-1863) "Dante and Virgil in Hell," also known as "The Barque of Dante" (1822). The romantic painting was inspired by the Italian poet Dante Alighieri’s (1265-1321) "Inferno" (1306-21). In the painting, as in the book, the Latin poet Virgil (in the red robe) guides Dante through Hell, where the demonic souls of the Florentines try to get into the boat as it crosses the River Styx.

Extent

32" x 40"

Physical Form

Oil on Canvas

Type of Resource

Still Image

Subject

Holocaust
Artistic Response
Survivor

Note

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 1930s Dresden. During his studies he developed an affection for the painting of the Renaissance, especially the works of Giotto and Dürer, as well as the German Expressionists of the 1920s. 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 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 was at the time 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 Hirschbergers 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.

Physical location

University of Minnesota, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. http://chgs.umn.edu/

purl

http://purl.umn.edu/229213

Access conditions

Use of this image is governed by U.S. and international copyright laws. Please contact the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies for permission to publish this image. http://chgs.umn.edu/

Categories:

Fritz Hirschberger: The Fifth Horseman

Search all collections...
Ames Library of South Asia
--> Classical Urdu Poetry
--> General Collection
--> Introduction to Punjabi
--> Introduction to Pushto
--> Journal of Indian Art
--> Stereoscopic Images of India
Andersen Horticultural Library
--> Agnes Williams Collection
--> Emma Roberts Collection
--> Leonhart Fuchs: Comparative Botanical Works
--> Minneapolis Seedswomen Catalogs
--> Minnesota Seed and Nursery Catalogs
--> Nurserymen's Platebooks
--> Vintage Seed and Nursery Catalog Covers
Bell Museum of Natural History
--> Francis Lee Jaques Collection
--> General Collection
Botanical Images
--> Botanical Images from the Collections of the University Libraries
Business Library
--> Historical Annual Reports
Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies
--> Artifact Collection
--> Betty Mittleman: Silence is Golden and the Warsaw Ghetto Series
--> Felix de la Concha: Portraying Memories: Portraits & Conversations with Survivors of the Shoah
--> Fritz Hirschberger: The Fifth Horseman
--> Fritz Hirschberger: The Sur-Rational Holocaust Paintings
--> Jordan Krimstein: Water Colors of Auschwitz
--> Life Under Nazism
--> Lucien Philippe Moretti: “Un sac de Billes” Lithographs
--> Maxine Rude: Displaced Europe 1945-1946
--> Oscar Arredondo: Welcome to Cleveland, Home of the…
Charles Babbage Institute
--> Association for Computing Machinery
--> Burroughs Corporation
--> Control Data Corporation
--> Fragile Publications
--> Oral History Collections
--> The COOK Report on Internet
--> United States National Bureau of Standards collection of computer literature
Children's Literature Research Collections
--> Beadle's Weekly
--> Hess Collection
--> Kerlan Collection Artwork
--> Kerlan Collection Manuscripts
--> Pulp Novel Covers
--> The Illustrated Police News
--> The Oz Collection
Department of American Indian Studies
--> Image Collection
Department of Psychology
--> Philosophical Psychology Lectures
East Asian Library
--> Manzanar Free Press
--> Ming Gazetteer Images
Entomology, Fisheries and Wildlife Library
First Flights
--> High Altitude Plastic Balloon Project
--> Images of Ballooning from the Piccard, Scholl, and Winzen Collections
Givens Collection of African American Literature
--> African American Literature
--> Countee Cullen Correspondence Collection
--> E. Ethelbert Miller Collection
--> Federal Writers' Project Narratives by Formerly Enslaved Peoples Collection
--> Givens Collection Ephemera
--> Givens Collection Pamphlets
--> Givens Collection Playbills and Programs
--> Lou Bellamy Rare Book Collection
--> Penumbra Theatre Company Records
--> Penumbra Theatre Playbills
--> Sara Roberson Collection
Humphrey School of Public Affairs
--> Audio Collection
--> Video Collection
Immigration History Research Center Archives
--> Arab American Collection
--> Armenian American Collection
--> Belarusan American Collection
--> Carpatho-Rusin American Collection
--> Croatian American Collection
--> Czech/Bohemian American Collection
--> Daughters of Penelope Oral History Project
--> Digitizing Immigrant Letters
--> Dongo (Newspaper)
--> E Aletheia (Newspaper)
--> Estonian American Collection
--> Finnish American Collection
--> Foundational Collection of Immigration Oral Histories
--> General Collection
--> Greek American Collection
--> Hugo Skrastins Papers
--> Hungarian American Collection
--> Il Grido Del Popolo (Newspaper)
--> Il Messaggero (Newspaper)
--> Il Nuovo Vessillo (Newspaper)
--> Il Paese (Newspaper)
--> Il Vindice (Newspaper)
--> Italian American Collection
--> Italians in Duluth Oral History Project
--> La Stampa Libera (Newspaper)
--> Latvian American Collection
--> Nomotages (Newspaper)
--> O Scugnizzo (Newspaper)
--> Polish American Collection
--> Rev. Kenneth Dexter Miller Papers, 1887-1968
--> Roma (Newspaper)
--> Romanian American Collection
--> Slovak American Collection
--> Slovenian American Collection
--> Twin Cities Ukrainian Folk Ballet and Chorus Collection
--> Ukrainian American Collection
--> Uusi Kotimaa (Newspaper)
--> Vita Nuova (Newspaper)
--> Zdenka Rypka Papers
Institute for Advanced Study
--> Bat of Minerva
--> IAS Programming
--> Intellectual and Cultural Leaders of Minnesota
--> Small-scale Food Initiatives in Southwest Minnesota
Institute for Mathematics and its Applications
--> Video Collection
James Ford Bell Library
--> Atlantic World Collection
--> Historical Maps
--> John Gabriel Stedman Archive and Book Manuscript
--> Spanish American Political Texts
Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies
--> AIDS Poster Collection
--> GAZE TV Collection
--> GLBT Pride Poster Collection
--> Minnesota Men of Color (MMC) Records
--> Transgender Oral History Project
John R. Borchert Map Library
--> Ames Library of South Asia Maps
--> City Maps
--> Ecological Study for the Twin Cities Metropolitan Area (Maps & Charts)
--> General Map Collection
--> General Minnesota Maps
--> Historical Atlases
--> Minneapolis / St. Paul Maps & Atlases
--> Minnesota County Maps, Plat Books and Atlases
--> Minnesota Transportation Maps
--> United States Geological Survey Polar Maps
Kautz Family YMCA Archives
--> Brooklyn Central YMCA records
--> Carlton Avenue YMCA records
--> Channing Tobias papers
--> Colored Work Department Records
--> Dick Kautz papers
--> Emma Young Dickson Papers
--> Foreign Secretary Reports from China
--> George Jaynes papers
--> George Williams College Theses and Dissertations
--> Harlem YMCA (135th Street) records
--> Harlem YMCA photographs
--> Image Collection
--> James O. Stephenson papers
--> McBurney YMCA records
--> Miscellaneous New York YMCA branch photographs
--> Miscellaneous YMCA research, planning and development records
--> New York City YMCA building and property records
--> New York YMCA Annual Reports
--> New York YMCA photographs
--> New York YMCA program and event records
--> New York YMCA reports, studies and surveys
--> Records of the YMCA of the city of New York
--> Records of YMCA International work in China, 1890-1991
--> Records of YMCA International Work in Palestine and Israel
--> Richard C. Morse papers
--> State, regional, national and international YMCA records collected by the YMCA of Greater New York
--> Student Work Records
--> Trench and Camp Newspaper - Camp Cody
--> Trench and Camp Newspaper - Camp Upton
--> United Service Organizations-related records
--> Uptown YMCA photographs
--> Video and Audio Collection
--> William A. Howes papers
--> Williamsbridge YMCA records
--> World War I-related records
--> YMCA Archives flat files collection
--> YMCA Archives memorabilia collection
--> YMCA Armed Services Department general administrative records
--> YMCA armed services scrapbooks and photographs
--> YMCA Historical Library and Kautz Family YMCA records
--> YMCA Industrial Work Records
--> YMCA marketing and communications files
--> YMCA North American international convention records.
--> YMCA of Greater New York Branch Newsletters
--> YMCA of the USA Yearbooks and Directories, 1854-2002
--> YMCA Program Services and Program Store records
--> YMCA State Committee records
--> YMCA urban work and Urban Group records
Learning Resources Center
--> Chinese Opera Performances
--> EngL 1301W Introduction to Multicultural American Literature
--> EngL 3001W Textual Interpretation, Analysis, and Investigation
--> EngL 3003W Historical Survey of British Literatures I
--> EngL 3007 Shakespeare: Rehearsing the Imagination
--> EngW 3102 Intermediate Fiction Writing: The Short Story
--> EngW 5606 / Jour 5606W Literary Aspects of Journalism
--> Independent and Distance Learning
--> Mus 1001 Fundamentals of Music
--> PubH 3040 Dying and Death in Contemporary Society
--> South Asia Language Archive
Literary Manuscripts Collections
Magrath Library
--> Agricultural Extension Service Collection
--> Doris S. Kirschner Cookbook Collection
--> Minnesota Rivers, United States Parks Service
--> Minnesota Soil Survey Collection
--> Mountain Plover Research Collection
Minnesota Agricultural Experiment Station
--> Image Collection
Minnesota Geological Survey
--> Minnesota Geological Survey Maps
Minnesota Institute for Sustainable Agriculture (MISA)
--> National Sustainable Agriculture Oral History Project
Music Library
--> Hymnal and Tune Book Collection
Nathan and Theresa Berman Upper Midwest Jewish Archives
--> Adath Jeshurun Congregation Records, 1884-2014
--> Frank and Arthur Eisenberg Papers
--> Hillel of the University of Minnesota Records
--> Jack Pink Papers
--> Mount Zion Temple Oral History records
--> Rabbi Harold H. Gordon papers, 1919-1975
--> Sharron and Oren Steinfeldt Photography Collection
--> Sidney Cohen Papers
--> Temple Israel Records, 1880-2014
--> Urban Exodus: The St. Louis Park Oral History Project records, 2011-2012
Northwest Architectural Archives
--> American Terra Cotta Company
--> Edwin H. Lundie Papers
--> Ellerbe Architects Papers Collection
--> Forecast Public Art Archives
--> John H. Howe Papers
--> Larson and McLaren Papers
--> Leroy S. Buffington Papers
--> Liebenberg and Kaplan Papers
--> Minneapolis Architecture 1848-1908
--> Pioneer-Endicott Building Plans
--> Stock Plan Books
--> Toltz, King and Day Papers
--> William Channing Whitney Collection
--> William Gray Purcell Papers
Performing Arts Archives
--> Ballet Arts Minnesota Records
--> Guthrie Theater Archives
--> James Sewell Ballet Records
--> John Munger Papers
--> Judith Brin Ingber Papers
--> Katherine Goodale Publications
--> Minnesota Dance Alliance Records
--> Minnesota Dance Pioneer Oral History Project
--> Minnesota Dance Theatre Records
--> Minnesota Orchestra
--> Nancy Hauser Dance Company Records
--> Performing Arts Publications Collection
--> Scenic Collections
--> Stephen Rueff Papers
Polar Geospatial Center
--> United States Geological Survey - Polar Maps Collection
School of Journalism and Mass Communication
--> Image Collection
School of Public Health
--> James A. Hamilton Collection
Social Welfare History Archives
--> The Job is Never Done: 50 Years of Documenting Social Welfare History
--> Addict in the Street
--> Alvin Schorr Papers
--> American Social Health Association Records
--> American Social Health Association Records 1905-1990
--> Charities Review, Charities, Charities and the Commons, The Survey, The Survey Midmonthly, The Survey Graphic Periodicals Collection
--> Family Service Association of America records
--> Family Service Association of American Records
--> Federal Government Social Welfare Publications
--> Forrest O. Wiggins papers, 1946-1966
--> Henry Street Music School records
--> Henry Street Settlement records, 1892-2005
--> Minneapolis Family and Children's Service records
--> Minneapolis YWCA Records
--> Minnesota Coalition for Battered Women records
--> Minnesota Social Service Association records
--> National Conference of Social Work Portraits
--> National Federation of Settlements and Neighborhood Centers records
--> National Florence Crittenton Mission records
--> National Guild of Community Music Schools records
--> Norman W. Moen papers, 1969-1985
--> Ralph and Ruth Tefferteller Papers
--> Social Work Yearbooks, 1929-1960
--> State Governments Social Welfare Publications Collection
--> United Neighborhood Houses of New York Records
--> United States Veterans Administration Social Work Service records
--> United Way of Minneapolis records
Special Collections and Rare Books
--> Arthur Kleiner Collection
--> Cuneiform Inscriptions
--> Eugene J. McCarthy Collection
--> Fifty Original Leave from Medieval Manuscripts - Otto Ege Collection
--> Friedrich Wachtsmuth Archive, 1929-1938
--> Individual Medieval Manuscript Leaves
--> Joseph S. Mertle Collection on the History of Photomechanics
--> Papyri and Ostraka Collection
--> Photochrom Collection
--> Postcard Collection
--> Rare Books and Manuscripts
--> Sherlock Holmes Collections
--> World War One Pamphlet Collection
University of Minnesota Archives
--> Audio Collection
--> Bell Museum of Natural History Negatives, 1898-1940s
--> Bell Museum of Natural History Records, 1849-2006
--> Bisbila University High School Yearbook
--> Campus Maps and Blueprints
--> Cass Gilbert Collection - Campus Plans
--> Central Files Records, 1851-1991
--> Cereal Rust Laboratory Records, 1823, 1946-2007
--> Christopher Webber Hall papers, 1880-1906
--> Corn Tassel Southern School of Agriculture Yearbook
--> Department of African and African American studies records
--> Department of Botany Print Photograph Collection, 1898-1903
--> Department of Botany Records, 1893-1989
--> Department of Geology and Mineralogy Records, 1915-1960
--> Department of Plant Pathology and Physiology Records, 1918-2007
--> Elvin C. Stakman papers, 1918-1973
--> Evergreen North Central School of Agriculture Yearbooks
--> General College Records, 1920-2006
--> Graduate School records, 1893-2005
--> Helen Hart Papers, 1917-1953
--> Henry Francis Nachtrieb papers, 1886-1929
--> Inventory of the Christopher Webber Hall papers, 1880-1906
--> Inventory of the Minnesota Geological and Natural History Survey papers, 1872-1906
--> John Gibler Papers, 1890-2006
--> Junior F. Hayden Botanical Photograph Collection
--> Minnesota Agricultural Experiment Station Records, 1882-2012
--> Minnesota Geological Survey Field Notebooks, 1877-1990
--> Minnesota Geological Survey Papers, 1912-1978
--> Moses Barron Papers, 1911-1978
--> Ned L. Huff Lantern Slide Collection, 1900-1952
--> Newton Horace Winchell Papers, 1872-1908
--> Norman E. Borlaug Papers, 1930-2006
--> Office of the President Records
--> Office of the Senior Vice President for System Academic Administration Records
--> Office of the Vice President for Student Affairs Records, 1941-1977
--> Photograph Collection
--> Richard Maurice Elliott Papers
--> Senior and Agrarian School of Agriculture Yearbooks
--> Stephen Farnum Peckham Papers, 1874-1880
--> Trip to North Shore, Minnesota Geological and Natural History Survey
--> University of Minnesota Athletics Records, 1876-2012
--> University of Minnesota Gopher Yearbooks
--> Verna Golden Scott Papers, 1919-1931
--> Video Collection
--> William Skinner Cooper papers
University of Minnesota Extension Service
--> Image Collection
University of Minnesota Law Library
--> Photograph Collection
University of Minnesota Press
--> MMPI Conversation with Ben-Porath and Tellegen
Upper Midwest Literary Archives
--> Business Records. Other Business Records. Neilson, Campbell W. Letter Book of Neilson of Augusta, Georgia, 3 April 1801 - 3 Jan. 1803.
--> Graywolf Press records
--> Michael L. Courtney Papers
--> Scott Walker Collection of Graywolf Press
--> World War Materials (Miscellaneous)
Wangensteen Historical Library of Biology and Medicine
--> Clara Barton Diaries
--> Hashika-e = Measles Posters
--> History and Development of Caesarean Section, Dr. Robert Patterson Harris (1822-1899)
--> James H. Stuart Letters
--> Medical Receipt Books
War Posters and Postcards
--> Propagnada
--> Rationing and conservation
--> Recreation
--> Religion
--> Views
--> War finance
--> War Posters and Postcards
--> Wochenspruch
Wilson Library
--> Journal Humoristique

Search the archive: in in in in	Limit search to the following collections: