Germany: Multiple Memorials for Berlin's Munchener Strasse Synagogue

Berlin, Germany. Image of the former Münchener Straße 37 on view in the Bayerischer Platz U-Bahn station. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016

Germany: Multiple Memorials for Berlin's Munchener Strasse Synagogue
by Samuel D. Gruber

In November 2016, I was in Berlin for a few days and had the chance to visit more Jewish and Holocaust-related historical and commemorative sites than usual. I've already posted about the Jewish cemetery on Grosse Hamburger Strasse and the monument and burial section at the Weissensee Cemetery for Jewish soldiers who died in World War I. Here's information on a lesser known commemorative site.

The domed synagogue at Münchener Straße 37 in the Schöneberg section of Berlin, designed by Jewish architect Max Fraenkel (1856-1926), was dedicated in 1910 and was at the center of a heavily Jewish neighborhood around Bayerischer Platz.  It was looted but not burned on Kristallnacht (November 9, 1938), but was subsequently damaged by aerial bombing during the war years, and  torn down in 1956. The synagogue, which was a transitional structure between historicism and modernism, was notable for its large dome, and as one of the more architecturally distinctive buildings in the largely residential neighborhood. The composer Kurt Weill had a job as the synagogue choir conductor for a few months in 1921. 

Today, there is a part of a school building on the synagogue site, but the synagogue is remembered in the neighborhood in various ways. Each memorial corresponds to a particular phase of Berlin's facing the past and acknowledge the Shoah. There is an official abstract street level monument (1960s), a student-built collaborative memorial (1990s) and recently an extensive photo exhibit underground in the nearby U-Bahn station.

At the school, the original synagogue outline is remembered through garden design and in 1994-95 students erected a memorial brick wall on the school grounds to remember local Jews who lived in Berlin-Schöneberg. According to school officials,"the idea was based on the artist Horst Hoheisel from Kassel who gave stimulus on his "memorial from down below" in the framework of the 6th grade teaching lesson "National Socialism".

Berlin, Germany. Löcknitz Primary School on site of the synagogue at Münchener Straße 37. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

In front of the school and near the street is a more traditional monument, designed in a cubist style by Gerson Fehrenbach in 1963. It declares: "Hier stand der 1909 erbauten synagoge der jüdischen Gemeinde" (Here stood the Synagogue of the Jewish Community built in 1909).

Berlin, Germany. Monument to destroyed at synagogue at Münchener Straße 37. Gerson Fehrenbach, arch., 1963. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

Berlin, Germany. Monument to destroyed at synagogue at Münchener Straße 37. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

A plaque beneath gives further information about the fate of the building.  

Hier stand von 1909-1956 eine Synagoge. Sie wurde während der Reichspogromnacht
am 9. Nov. 1938 wegen ihrer Lage in einem
Wohnhaus nicht zerstört.
Nach der Vertreibung und Vernichtung
der jüdischen Mitbürgerinnen und Mitbürger
durch die Nationalsozialisten verlor sie
ihre Funktion und wurde 1956 abgerissen.”

In the nearby U-Bahn station there is a extensive photo exhibition on the history of the neighborhood. Since it was a heavily Jewish district in the interwar period, there is are many images of the synagogue and of prominent Jews who lived nearby. When I visited the station in November 2016, the former synagogue - already destroyed once - was suffering the indignity of having a temporary construction barrier interrupting the view of its full facade.
 

Berlin, Germany. images of the former Münchener Straße 37 on view in the Bayerischer Platz U-Bahn station, with a construction barrier further "destroying" the synagogue today. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016

Berlin, Germany. Image of the memorial wall constricted by local students on the site the former Münchener Straße 37. Photo on view in the Bayerischer Platz U-Bahn station. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016

Berlin, Germany. Image of the memorial wall constricted by local students on the site the former Münchener Straße 37. Photo on view in the Bayerischer Platz U-Bahn station. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

Bayerischer Platz neighborhood, including Münchener Straße, is also the location of the noteworthy "Places of Remembrance," (Orte des Erinnerns) project designed by artists Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock and installed in 1993.  The memorial, which consists of 80 signs which flatly state the dates and essence of laws promulgated by the Nazis in the 1930s to curb the rights of Jews.  This project remains one of the most thought provoking Holocaust commemorative installations anywhere - if one takes the time to look.

Berlin, Germany. Bayerischer Platz and "Places of Remembrance," (Orte des Erinnerns) project designed by Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

ABerlin, Germany. Bayerischer Platz and "Places of Remembrance," (Orte des Erinnerns) project designed by Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

Berlin, Germany. Bayerischer Platz and "Places of Remembrance," (Orte des Erinnerns) project designed by Renata Stih and Frieder Schnock. Photo: Samuel D. Gruber 2016.

Exhibition: Photographs of Chaim Gross Sculpture

Sculptor Chaim Gross at work on Harvest at 1939 New York World's Fair. Photo by Eliot Elisofon, courtesy of Renee and Chaim Gross Foundation

Exhibition: Photographs of Chaim Gross Sculpture

The current exhibit of photographs of the sculptural work of Chaim Gross (1904-1991), “Displayed: Stages for Sculpture,” is on view until December 16 at the Renee and Chaim Gross Foundation in New York. Gross practiced what he (and contemporaries) called “direct carving” and created totemic human figures out of wood and stone. According to the exhibit organizers he "was a perfect subject for photographers who wanted to capture his creative process." Sculpture, as one of the most active, physical and, of-course, 3-dimensional forms of art, and one that could be represented well in black and white with light and shadow, appealed to photographers and was frequently featured in the many photo and news magazines of the early 20th-century.

According to the Foundation's press release:

"The photographs chart the “stages” in the making of sculpture, and public “stages” displaying Gross’s work, such as the 1939 World’s Fair, educational carving demonstrations, and commercial print media. The exhibition, curated by the Foundation's archivist Zak Vreeland, features images from the Foundation’s collection by renowned photographers Arnold Newman (1918-2006), Eliot Elisofon (1911-73), and Rudy Burckhardt (1914-99). It also includes works by less known, yet equally compelling photographers Robert M. Damora (1912-2009), Soichi Sunami (1885-1971), Walter Rosenblum (1919-2006), and Arnold Eagle (1909-92).

Chaim Gross knew many of these photographers at the beginning of their careers and became particularly close with Arnold Newman and Eliot Elisofon. Gross hired them to record the process of sculpting, both in the privacy of the studio as well as various public venues. The photographers also featured Gross, his house, studio, and sculpture in news stories, fashion spreads, and advertisements in publications such as Life and Glamour. The exhibition explores this relationship between sculpture and photography. It also considers the convergence of two modes of production: Gross’s signature process of hand carving and the mechanical reproduction of the photograph. Of particular interest are photographs of window displays that featured Gross’s sculpture in arrangements with mannequins and merchandise from c. 1940-50 at Bonwit Teller, Saks Fifth Avenue and Lane Bryant. These include an eight-window display for Bonwit Teller designed by the preeminent window designer Gene Moore (1910-98)."

Read more: http://blogs.forward.com/the-arty-semite/139204/#ixzz1QrP1DBfb

View the 1957 film The Sculptor Speaks (17 minutes) on the Gross foundation website.

Read more about the life and work of Chaim Gross at artnet.com.

As it happens, the Syracuse University Special Collection Research Center has four boxes of Gross papers. I'm looking forward to finding time in the next year to examine these, or to interest a student in the project.

Exhibition: London's Ben Uri Gallery Hosts Major Jacques Lipchitz Drawing Exhibition

Exhibition: London's Ben Uri Gallery Hosts Major Jacques Lipchitz Drawing Exhibition
by Samuel D. Gruber

(ISJM) The Ben Uri Gallery in London will open a major exhibition of over 150 drawings by famed Lithuania-born Paris School artist Jacques Lipchitz (1891-1973). Jacques Lipchitz, Master Drawings: The Anatomy of a Sculptor will open on Wednesday 6th May, 2009.

The exhibition spans 60 years of the career of Lipchitz, known as a 'life long cubist," but whose work - as is well demonstrated in his drawings - was as much expressive as analytic. According to the Ben Uri announcement, the exhibition of this works (from an American collection) is the first British museum survey of Lipchitz since the 1986 exhibition The Lipchitz Gift, Models for Sculpture at the Tate Gallery. Lipchitz's preparatory work was featured in the traveling exhibition Selected Master Drawings in 1974-75. This present exhibition will expose a new generation to Lipchitz's energetic style that in subject matter combined, myth, dream, symbol and memory into a unique graphic and sculptural language.

This year is the 100th anniversary of Lipchitz's arrival in Paris, where he became a leading figure in what came to be called the Paris School, where he was also a leader among the many East European immigrant artists. Born Chaim Jacob Lipchitz in Druskieniki, Lithuania in 1891, the artist was just 18 when he came to Paris. Two years later, in 1911, he moved to the Paris studio and apartment at 54, Rue du Montparnasse where lived his friend and fellow Litvak, Lazar Berson. Berson later moved on to London, and in July 1915 founded the Ben Uri.

Lipchitz left Paris in 1940, fleeing to Toulouse after the German occupation of the city. In 1941 Amercian diplomat Varian Fry helped smuggle the artist to New York. While Lipchitz is much celebrated in Israel, where his monumental sculpture Our Tree of Life (1962-72) adorns the grounds of Hadassah Hospital on Mount Scopus, he did not travel to Israel until 1963. Though he died in Capri (Italy) in 1973, he is buried in Jerusalem.

At Ben Uri Gallery, 108A Boundary Road, London NW8 0RH until 26 July.

For more information see: www.benuri.org.uk / info@benuri.org.uk

France: Holocaust Monument at Drancy (Paris) Vandalized

France: Holocaust Monument at Drancy (Paris) Vandalized

by Samuel D. Gruber

(ISJM) Various news reports describe the vandalism of the Holocaust Monument at Drancy (now a northern suburb of Paris, midway between the city center and Charles De Gaulle airport), France, on April 11, 2009. A video surveillance camera filmed the act and the perpetrators.

Drancy was the primary point of collection and deportation of over 67,000 (some estimates cite 77,000) French Jews (and some others) to Auschwitz-Birkenau and Sobibor, from where few returned. Approximately 3,000 prisoners died at Drancy from malnutrition and mistreatment.

Today, a memorial consisting a large sculpture by Shlomo Selinger and a small exhibition located in a former transport boxcar was established in 1976.

A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust describes the monument as follows (with extensive photos):

Sculpture: The two blocks to the side of the central sculpture symbolize the doors of death. Drancy was considered to be the anteroom of death. The central sculpture is composed of 10 people, representing the number of people necessary for collective prayer (Minyan). On the front of the central sculpture a man and a woman embody suffering and dignity. In the center, the head of a man wearing the ritual cube (Tefilin) symbolizes prayer. Below, two inverted heads symbolize death. The Hebrew letters "LAMED" and "VAV" are formed by the hair, arms and beard of the two people at the top of the sculpture. These two letters have the value of 36, which is the number of righteous men in the world according to Jewish tradition

The interior of the boxcar is used as a museum about the camp. It includes a display of photographs, documents, and texts depicting the horrible living conditions and events that took place at Drancy.

The existence of the camp, established by the French Vichy government in 1941 as an internment camp was not officially acknowledged by the French government until 1995. According to the website of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, "Until July 1, 1943, French police staffed the camp under the overall control of the German Security Police. In July 1943 the Germans took direct control of the Drancy camp and SS officer Alois Brunner became camp commandant."

The camp was a multistory U-shaped building that had served as a police barracks before the war. Barbed wire surrounded the building and its courtyard. The capacity of the camp was 5,000 prisoners. Five subcamps, used primarily as warehouses for personal property confiscated from Jews, were located throughout Paris: at the Austerlitz train station, the Hotel Cahen d'Anvers, the Levitan furniture warehouse, the wharf in Bercy, and the Rue de Faubourg. Approximately 70,000 prisoners passed through Drancy between August 1941 and August 1944. Except for a small number of prisoners (mostly members of the French resistance), the overwhelming majority were Jews. A few thousand prisoners managed to obtain release during the first year of the camp's existence.

According to reports, Raphael Chemouni, responsible for maintaining the memorial, said it was the first time that it had been a target. "Until now there has been a very great respect for this monument," he said. There was some previous vandalism reported in 2005.

According to the JTA the train car" and a stone pillar, were daubed with swastikas. Shopfronts in the towns of Drancy and Bobigny were also attacked, according to the police." Lucien Tismander, from the Auschwitz Memorial Association, said this weekend's vandalism was particularly hurtful because of Drancy's symbolic importance in the history of France. "This monument is in a sense the tomb of the 76,000 French deportees and it has been sullied," he said.