When staring at humanity’s darkest hours, it is easy to become so blinded by disgust that we forget to honor the beauty that was lost to it.
On March 20, the Holocaust Memorial Center Zekelman Family Campus will fix that when it hosts the Detroit Symphony Orchestra (DSO), which will play music from Jewish composers murdered in the Holocaust.
This event is part of a special exhibit called, “Sifting Through the Ashes,” which runs until March 27. The exhibit will be opened before the show starting at 6 pm.
Previously at the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia, this showing depicts the artist’s reaction to seeing sites in Ukraine and Poland where the atrocities occurred.
It features 20 photos and nine large-scale richly textural oil paintings by artist Bruce Gendleman. They convey the horrors of the Holocaust and keep the memory alive as we begin to enter a “post-witness world” as survivors age and die.
Also part of the tour, are sculptures by Holocaust Memorial Center survivor speaker Henry Friedman, which depict his experiences in the Holocaust.
The music begins at 7 p.m. The DSO will play the works of Pavel Haas, Gideon Klein, Hans Krasa and Viktor Ullman, all lost in the Holocaust.
“The chamber recital by the talented DSO musicians will be particularly poignant, as they perform the works by the brilliant Jewish composers who were senselessly murdered during the Holocaust. It is through events like this that the accomplishments of these composers continue to live on and be cherished,” says Rabbi Eli Mayerfeld, CEO, Holocaust Memorial Center. “We are proud to host An Evening of Art & Music and know this night filled with moving paintings, photographs and beautiful music will touch the hearts and minds of everyone in attendance.”
Like many Jewish intellectuals, Austrian born composer and pianist Viktor Ullmann and Czechoslovakian-born Pavel Haas were imprisoned at Theresienstadt. There they continued to produce work and, even in the heart of Hell on earth, both gave secret concerts for the inmates.
Both were silenced forever in 1944 in the gas chambers at Auschwitz-Birkenau.
An Evening of Art & Music is generously supported by Julie and Peter Cummings.
The event is $20 for Holocaust Memorial Center members and $30 for non-members. A dessert reception will follow the chamber recital. RSVP 248-553-2400 x 112 or rsvp@holocaustcenter.org
DSO to play works by Jewish composers murdered by the Nazis at Holocaust Memorial Center March 20 added by M Lapham on
View all posts by M Lapham →
