The artist Lenke Rothman did not view her art as a way of processing the trauma of the Holocaust but rather as a response to it. In the seminar “Konsten som svar på Förintelsen” (Art as a Response to the Holocaust), researcher Rebecka Katz Thor and professor emerita Lena Rubinstein Reich engage in a conversation about how art can be seen as a response to the Holocaust. The discussion, inspired by the exhibition “Life as Cloth” is organized by the research project Memory and Activism at Malmö University. The programme wild be held in Swedish.

Rebecka Katz Thor, one of the curators of the exhibition “Life as Cloth” will discuss the exhibition and Lenke Rothman’s approach to incorporating her history into her art. Lena Rubinstein Reich has, over several years, worked on a narrative in text and images about her mother Cesia’s life before, during, and after the Holocaust. Rubinstein Reich will speak about the significance of image-making and the watercolor technique as a means to depict and share her mother’s experiences with the world, drawing from her own work: forty watercolors accompanied by text, often featuring her mother Cesia’s own words. The conversation will be moderated by Malin Thor Tureby.

The seminar is part of the series “Remembering, Researching, and Educating about the Holocaust” at Malmö University. In this project, researchers and Holocaust survivors collaborate to explore various ways of remembering, narrating, documenting, collecting, researching, conveying, and educating about the Holocaust. The seminar series is organized under the auspices of the research project “Memory and Activism – The Role of Survivors in the Knowledge Production about the Holocaust.”

Participants

Rebecka Katz Thor is a researcher working at Sweden’s Museum of the Holocaust, contributing to the development of the permanent museum. She is also one of the curators of the exhibition “Life as Cloth.” During the seminar, she will discuss the exhibition and how Lenke Rothman’s art can be interpreted as a response to the Holocaust.

Lena Rubinstein Reich has worked in research and education and is professor emerita in pedagogy. Alongside her academic career, she has been painting watercolors for more than thirty years. She has held solo art exhibitions and participated in several juried exhibitions.

Malin Thor Tureby is a professor of history at Malmö University and the project leader for the research project “Memory and Activism: The Role of Survivors in the Knowledge Production about the Holocaust”, funded by the Swedish Research Council.