Category Archives: Art

Hedwig Brenner • Homage to a Pioneer

Erhard Roy Wiehn: Homage to a Pioneer
Christel Wollmann-Fiedler: Dearest Hedy
Artists of Jewish Origin with Hedwig Brenner

I. Christel Wollmann-Fiedler in Conversation with Hedy Brenner

II. Prefaces and Epilogues in the Sequence of the Six Brenner Volumes
Jewish Women in Visual Arts I (1998)
Jewish Women in Visual Arts II (2004)
Jewish Women in Visual Arts III (2007)
Jewish Women in Visual Arts IV (2011)
Jewish Women in Visual Arts V (2013)
Jewish Women in Music and Dance VI (2017)

III. Hedwig Brenner with Christel Wollmann-Fiedler

An Atmosphere of Hope and Confidence

Eine Atmosphäre von Hoffnung und Zuversicht • An Atmosphere of Hope and Confidence
Hilfe für verfolgte Juden in Rumänien, Transnistrien und Nordsiebenbürgen 1940-1944 •
Aid for Persecuted Jews in Romania, Transnistria and Northern Transylvania 1940-1944
296 pages, 170 x 240 mm, with numerous illustrations, hardcover, numerous partly colored illustrations September 2020 ISBN 978-3-86732-348-2 Lukas Verlag

During the Second World War, Romania was an ally of the German Reich. The spectrum of persecution of Jews in the Romanian territory was broad. It ranged from legislative measures to deprivation of rights and expropriation to pogroms, deportations, and mass murder. 
However, individual courageous individuals from various social strata came to the aid of the oppressed people. This book presents these often anonymous helpers who put their lives at risk for the first time to German readers. At the end of June 1941, for example, the twenty-one year old factory worker Elisabeta Nicopoi from Jassy hid several Jewish neighbors who thus escaped the pogrom. Since early 1943, staff members of the Romanian Red Cross had been bringing medicines collected in Bucharest to the hard-to-reach ghettos in the Romanian occupied territory of Transnistria in southern Ukraine. In the same year, financial aid from foreign Jewish organizations also reached the helper networks. Even while the Romanian army was still fighting alongside the Wehrmacht, Jewish survivors from Romania were able to emigrate by ship via Turkey to Palestine from 1944, among them many orphans. Only later were helpers honored. Many of them were imprisoned in communist prisons; only a few survived.

Gottes Mühlen in Berlin • Mills of God in Berlin
Ausgewählte Gedichte • Selected Poems
Herausgegeben und kommentiert von Andrei Corbea-Hoisie •
Published and Commented by Andrei Corbea-Hoisie

156 pages, paperback, 2020 ISBN 978-3-89086-393-1 Rimbaud Verlag

The present edition intends to reconstruct the book project entitled “Gottes Mühlen in Berlin” by Immanuel Weissglas, whose publication was stopped in Bucharest in 1947 for unclear reasons – be they political or economic – and never appeared again in the planned design. In the course of time, only individual poems were selected for publication; Weissglas himself revised numerous texts into new versions and incorporated them into the volume of poetry “Der Nobiskrug” (1972).

Leben und Tod in der Epoche des Holocaust in der Ukraine •
Life and Death in the Era of the Holocaust in Ukraine
Zeugnisse von Überlebenden • Testimonies of Survivors
December 2019 ISBN: 978-3-86331-475-0 Pages: 1152 METROPOL

For decades, the Holocaust in Ukraine received little attention. It is only since the 1990s that German crimes have increasingly attracted the interest of historians and the public, both in Germany and in Ukraine itself. Nevertheless, there is still little knowledge of what happened in the former Soviet Socialist Republic. The historian Boris Zabarko, himself a survivor of the Shargorod ghetto, was one of the first to systematically research the fate of Jews under German occupation in Ukraine. For more than 20 years he has been collecting survivors’ reports and interviewing those who were once persecuted. In 1999, a first publication in Russian appeared, followed by a multi-volume work. The present edition contains more than 180 reports of survivors. They are assigned to the respective crime scenes, for which introductory contextual information is given, and follow the chronology of the occupation. The result is a “Geography of the Holocaust” in the Ukraine.

Unser Überlebenswill war stark • Our Will To Survive Was Strong
Gespräche mit M. Bartfeld-Feller über Czernowitz, die sibirische Verbannung und Israel •
Discussions with M. Bartfeld-Feller about Czernowitz, the Siberian Banishment and Israel
1st edition 2020, 68 pages, ISBN 978-3-86628-678-8 Hartung-Gorre Verlag

1. Erhard Roy Wiehn: From Czernowitz through Siberia to Israel – Tel Aviv 1996
2. Christel Wollmann-Fiedler: 50 Years of Siberian Exile – Tel Aviv 2012

Todefuge Gedichte und Prosa 1952-1967 • Deathfugue Poems and Prose 1952-1967
Audio Book CD, 2 CDs, running time: 1h 59min ISBN: 978-3-8445-3919-6
Published on September 14, 2020 Random House

Paul Celan: One of the most important German-language poets in original language. His poetry is world literature full of musicality and form, which puts the utmost of human experience into words. Paul Celan was famous for the very special way he recited his poems. Between his scandalous reading in 1952 in front of Gruppe 47 and his death as a celebrated poet, there are almost two decades in which Celan presented his poems in numerous radio and public readings and gradually changed his style. In this new compilation, these original recordings can be heard for the first time.

The Aron Kodesh in the Siret Synagogue • A Criminal Case

Below are the links to the full story:

https://jewish-heritage-europe.eu/2019/02/11/romania-ark-of-historic-synagogue-dismantled/

https://jewish-heritage-europe.eu/2019/02/13/update-comparative-photos-siret-ark-and-replica/

http://cja.huji.ac.il/browser.php?mode=set&id=24254

http://moreshet-auctions.com/the-beautiful-aron-kodesh-of-the-great-synagogue-of-siret-in-romaniabeginning-of-the-19th-century-a-museum-worthy-item-of-extreme-historic-value


Romanian Press Coverage (Selection):
https://goo.gl/Fnx14o
https://goo.gl/H3ESY2
https://goo.gl/uDQ6rP

Czernowitz Art Album by Tetyana Dugaeva and Sergij Osatschuk

By the way and in the course of her research, the prominent art historian and former director of the Czernowitz Art Museum, Tetyana Dugaeva, showed up an art forgery which slipped in even into our Czernowitz Art Gallery. As a matter of fact, Berthold Klinghofer’s “Czernowitz. Ringplatz” from the year 1911 (at the top) found its counterpart in Victor Volkov’s copy (at the bottom). Excellent detective work!

Documentary by Oana Giurgiu: Aliyah Dada

▶︎Full movie, uncut and in English◀︎

Libra Film: Following 130 years of the emigration of Romanian Jews towards the Holy Land, both history of East Europe and Israel will be revealed, in a light, colourful film depicting history in human stories and collages, as a tribute to Tristan Tzara – born in the same town from where first Jews emigrated to Palestine in 1882.

In the same time we will discover all absurdities and contradictions in the relationship between Romanians and Jews: Romanians were responsible for some of the cruelest pogroms during the Second World War, but still Romania had the largest Jewish surviving population at the end of the war, after USSR. Communist regimes were trading this population with Israel, and Ceausescu made even a step forward requesting cash payment per person, but same Ceausescu was the one convincing Egypt to sign the peace with Israel.

In Israel, the population from Romania became the country’s fourth largest group, but they always stayed in the shadow, sometimes hiding their origins, even though important personalities emerged from that community, even though they have brought important elements to their new country; the Israeli anthem and national dance “hora” are both inspired of the Romanian folklore, to mention just that.

Today, a return to democracy in Romania has attracted many Israeli investors, almost the same number as the former Jewish community that is slowly vanishing. In Israel, a museum of Romanian Jewry will be built, in the first settlement made by them in Rosh Pina. But will their memory be carried on by the new generations?

Jewish Women in Music and Dance

Editorial Notice: http://www.hartung-gorre.de/Brenner_VI.htm
Amazon: https://goo.gl/D5gg8p

Excerpt from the preface by Rita Calabrese: “[…] Dieser Band VI und hoffentlich nicht letzter ist der Musik und dem Tanz gewidmet. Nicht nur Stars wie Barbra Streisand, Amy Winehouse und Bette Midler sind zusammen mit Sängerinnen aus vielen Zeiten zu finden, sondern auch Pianistinnen und Violinistinnen zusammen mit Komponistinnen, die in Fanny Mendelssohn ihre Vorläuferin hatten, sowie auch Dirigentinnen. Auffallend ist die lange Liste der Künstlerinnen, die ein tragisches Ende in Auschwitz-Birkenau und anderen KZs gefunden haben, darunter die Pianistinnen Mathilde Borgenicht und Leopoldine Oppenheimer, die Violinistin Alma Rose, die Nichte Gustav Mahlers. Andere hingegen haben dank der Musik überleben können, wie Esther Bejarano und Fania Fenelon, die über das Orchester in Auschwitz geschrieben haben, Yvette Assaeler, Grete Klingsberg, Rachel Knobler und andere. Zu erwähnen ist auch Lin Jaldati, die während der Deportation Anne Frank kennengelernt hatte. Als eine der ersten hat sie die jiddische Musik in der DDR bekannt gemacht. Noch etwas zu diesem wertvollen Werk muss man hervorheben, und zwar die verdienstvolle Verfasserin. Geboren im k.u.k. Czernowitz, das später rumänisch wurde und längst zur Ukraine gehört, ist Hedwig Brenner über politische, geschichtliche und sprachliche Grenzen nach Israel gekommen, wohin sie das kostbare Erbe der deutschsprachigen jüdischen Kultur mitgenommen und einen neuen Anfang als Schriftstellerin gewagt hat.Im Hebräischen heißt Leben Chajim und ist Plural. Wie kaum eine andere zeigt Hedi Brenner die Vielfalt und Unschätzbarkeit der menschlichen Existenz, und dafür danken wir.”

Hedwig Brenner in April 2014

Meyer Ebner on Leibu Levin – 1935

From Ruth Levin, an article from the “Ost-Yiddishe Zeitung”, 2.6.1935:

“…Dr. Landau introduced to the audience a young man whose name
should not be forgotten. Probably, we’ll hear from him again and again.

Levin isn’t a singer, rather he’s an artistic reader. He’s not a reader, rather
he’s an actor. As a matter of fact he’s all in one: singer, artistic reader, actor
and poet. Why also poet? He reads to us only the poems of others, does he not?
That being so, this is the secret of his art. He reveals what is hidden between the lines.
He brings the poet to completion. He draws from the poet’s soul riches the poet himself
did not know of, riches that were hidden in his sub-conscious…

Frequently the words of the text in his mouth serve solely as a stimulus that awakens –
just for a passing moment – the poetic spiritual inheritance of his own, and that has
always to be born anew, like the music.

The art of Leibu Levin needs not only to be heard, though, but also to be seen. He himself
one has to hear and see, how he breathes into the dim hall, into the pearls of strangers’
poetry, his young burning soul, the creative, sometimes ecstatic, and sometimes weeping
soul…  His profound understanding drew one deeply into the fables of
Eliezer Steinbarg and the ballads of Itzik Manger.

From time to time the reader becomes singer, and only when he was seen as well as heard,
did I finally understand the meaning of the old expression “to sing and to say”
regarding troubadours and minnesingers. When his spoken word passes to song, it reminds me
of a flying ship hovering above the earth and taking off to the blue heavens…

Talent is as rare as gold. From the gold it is possible to forge a holiday crown for
priests who serve gods and it is possible to pay with it the penance for sinful impurity…

Talent can be refined to capture surpassing art, or can descend to cheap popular
entertainment. It seems to me that all in Leibu Levin aspires toward and is uplifted to the
shining heights of noble art .”

Dr. Meyer Ebner
The newspaper “Ost-Yiddishe Zeitung”, 2.6.1935

Ostjüdische_Zeitung_1935_00169 Kopie