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Painted From Memories
Holocaust Memorial Center
in Farmington Hills hosts its
first major art exhibition.
Robyn Gorell
Special to the Jewish News
A
new exhibit, "Icons of Loss:
The Art of Samuel Bak," opens
Sunday, May 23, at the Holocaust
Memorial Center Zekelman Family
Campus in Farmington Hills. The exhibit,
with its display of 60 visually arrest-
ing paintings, studies and sketches by
renowned surrealist artist and ghetto sur-
vivor Samuel Bak, runs through Aug. 15.
There will be a grand opening reception
for the exhibit at 7 p.m. on May 23; it is
open to the public.
According to the Pucker Gallery in
Boston, which represents much of his art,
"Bak was born in 1933 in Vilna, Poland,
and was recognized from an early age as
possessing extraordinary artistic talent.
As Vilna came under German occupation
in 1940, Bak and his family moved into
the Vilna ghetto and later to a labor camp,
from which he was smuggled and given
refuge in a monastery.
"Bak and his mother arrived in the
newly established State of Israel in 1948.
The artist, who currently lives in Boston,
spent 15 years on and off in Israel. He also
has lived and worked in Poland, Germany,
France, Italy and Switzerland."
Now 76, Bak has spent his life on "the
artistic expression of the destruction and
dehumanization that make up his child-
hood memories." Though he's known
mainly for his Holocaust paintings, his
work also includes a much broader array
of subjects, including a series devoted to
chess and depictions of nature and child-
hood objects.
"Samuel Bak was fascinated and trou-
bled by a society that allows such sense-
less horrors as the Holocaust to take place
while questioning a God who doesn't stop
them:' explains Stephen Goldman, execu-
tive director of the Holocaust Memorial
Center Zekelman Family Campus. "He
abhors the loss of lives of countless inno-
cent children in such conflicts."
Among the paintings that visitors to the
Nate Bloom
Special to the Jewish News
Eleven To Watch
vi2 The
May 10 issue of Time magazine
W features its annual list of the world's
"100 most influential people." Most
41) of the "100" are not influential in the
sense of wielding great power. Rather,
the magazine says, it sought out
people "whose ideas, innovations, and
actions are shaping our world." (This
list, with brief essays about each per-
son, also is on the Time.com website.)
Eleven Jewish persons are on the
list, although only one is identified
as Jewish in the issue. As I learned
more about this very erudite 11, I
thought to myself what remarkable
conversations they could have if
brought together at a dinner party.
"Car czar" Ron Bloom, 55, and
International Monetary Fund head
Dominque Strauss Kahn, 62, are the
two Jews among the 25 persons in
Time's "Leaders" category.
Bloom, who was strongly influenced
by the Labor Zionist movement,
-
58
May 20 • 2010
worked as an investment banker
before taking a big pay cut to work for
the Steelworkers' union. Time notes
that his business/labor experience
helped him work with all sides to bro-
ker the rescue of Chrysler and GM.
Strauss-Kahn
has a similar back-
ground: He began as
an economics pro-
fessor and became
a leading French
Socialist party politi-
cian with strong ties
to labor. As France's
Dominique
economics minister
Strauss-Kahn
in the late '90s, he
was able to institute
very successful free market reforms
because workers trusted him.
Three Jews are found in Time's
"Artists" category: Damon Lindelof,
37, the co-creator and co-writer of
ABC's Lost; Lea Michele, 25, the
standout star of the hit musical TV
series Glee; and fashion designer
Marc Jacobs, 47.
Time describes Michele as "wise,
Signal of Identity by Samuel Bak
Elegy by Samuel Bak
HMC will view will be two from the series
of images Bak created based on a well-
known photo of a young Jewish boy from
the Warsaw Ghetto.
The child stands with his hands in the
air while an SS officer levels his gun at
him. The picture has become one of the
most poignant images to represent the
realities of the Holocaust. Bak has painted
numerous images of the boy, beginning in
the 1990s.
Here, Bak answers our questions:
and goal of the pieces?
A: I use contemporary or universally
Q: How would you define the "Icons of
Loss" exhibit in terms of content, style
savvy, beautiful,
gifted ... and with
perfect pitch."
Jacobs is described
as "someone who
never follows trends
... an intellectual who
has an aesthetic like
Marc Jacobs
no other."
Five Jews are in Time's "Thinkers"
category: Edna Foa, 73, an Israeli
clinical psycholo-
gist who teaches
at the University of
Pennsylvania and
is a leader in the
treatment of post-
traumatic stress dis-
order; Jaron Lanier,
48, a computer sci-
Edna Foa
entist, composer, and
philosopher who was
a pioneer in virtual reality technol-
ogy; Victor Pinchuk, 49, a very pow-
erful Ukrainian businessman whose
philanthropies include AIDS aware-
ness programs and Jewish communal
institutions; Michael Pollan, 55, a
familiar symbols to create the images of
my paintings. Most tend to relate to the
experience of facing irreparable loss.
Although my own story reflects my
survival in the Holocaust, I try to speak
of experiences that touch the core of the
human condition. That loss might be of an
individual or collective character — the
loss of a tangible thing, a real person or an
illusion. My paintings often evoke the pain
of bereavement.
The image of the boy from the Warsaw
Ghetto, well known from hummer-
Michael Pollan
leading critic of agri-
business and one of
the most important
champions of a diet
based on healthy,
unprocessed foods;
and Jaime Lerner,
72, a Brazilian Jew
whose parents came
from Poland.
A trained architect, Lerner trans-
formed the city of Curitiba (pop.1.5
million) during his time as mayor. He
instituted cost-effective land use and
mass transportation schemes that are
now being copied all over the world.
Finally, in Time's "Heroes" cat-
egory is actor Ben Stiller, 45. Robert
DeNiro wrote about Stiller for Time,
calling him "a deeply comic spirit
and a deeply kind spirit." DeNiro
describes how Stiller has deftly used
humor to help raise funds for Haiti.
If you want Web links to good
bios on the people above, includ-
ing information about their Jewish
backgrounds, contact me at mid-
dleoftheroadl@aol.com .