The Holocaust has become the subject of countless works of art as individuals and communities seek to memorialize victims and make sense of a senseless event. This section contains hundreds of examples ranging from small drawings to large memorials.
Camps
Many former camp locations are now memorials. In many cases, buildings have been preserved or even reconstructed for visitors. At other sites entirely new memorials have been constructed. The following photo galleries offer examples of all three approaches to camp memorials.
Memorials at Dachau concentration camp including the International Monument by Glid Nandor.
This VR movie shot from the center of the roll call square at Dachau includes views of reconstructed barracks, preserved buildings, the Roman Catholic memorial, and the International Monument.
Jewish memorial at Dachau concentration camp.
Protestant memorial at Dachau concentration camp.
Roman Catholic memorial at Dachau concentration camp.
The exhibits at Auschwitz include a number of artworks in response to the Holocaust.
Virtual reality movie of the International Monument to the Victims of Fascism at Birkenau.
Memorial at the Majdanek death camp.
The memorials of the nations at Mauthausen camp including: Albania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, France, Great Britain, Germany, Greece, and the Gypsy (Roma and Sinti) memorial.
The memorials of the nations at Mauthausen camp including: Hungary, the Jewish memorial, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovenia, the Spanish Republican Army memorial, the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia.
Other monuments and memorials at Mauthausen.
Photographs of monuments at the Neuengamme camp including the memorials of the nations and the Commerative House.
Monuments at the Plaszow camp.
Sculptures at the Ravensbrück camp including Muttergruppe, Burdened Woman, Frau mit Abgeschnitten Haar, and Frau mit Tuch.
Memorials at the Ravensbrück Camp including the rooms of the nations and other exhibits.
The memorial at Treblinka was designed by Francisek Duszenko and Adam Haupt. The original camp was completely destroyed by the Nazis. Visitors arriving at the site of this extermination camp now walk about 600 feet through dense woods along a path of concrete railroad ties leading to 17,000 granite stones surrounding a central monument. This memorial is suggestive of a graveyard, with the standing stones representing towns and communities destroyed during the war.
Three VR movies of the memorial at Treblinka.
Warsaw Ghetto Memorials
Like Treblinka, the Warsaw Ghetto was completely destroyed, so monuments here mark the locations of former sites. The first World War II-related memorial was built in 1946 to mark the third anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Designed by L.M. Suzin, it is a red sandstone disk which was tilted toward the entrance gate to the ghetto. It marks the site of the first armed confrontation. The inscription reads:
To the memory of those who died in unparalleled and heroic struggle for the dignity and freedom of the Jewish nation, for free Poland, and for the liberation of mankind--the Jews of Poland.Unfortunately the entrance gate to the ghetto was torn down, depriving the marker of its specific point of reference. Thus, the marker is now often misinterpreted as a sewer entrance, like those used by the fighters to leave the ghetto.
The largest monument in the former ghetto is the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes designed by Natan Rappaport. This monument, which was unveiled in 1948, is built of stone originally quarried for a Nazi victory monument and is the site of annual commemorative events.
A series of granite blocks leads from the Rappaport memorial to the Umschlagplatz, the deportation point for the ghetto residents. Each block commemorates an individual or event in the ghetto.
The trail ends at the new Umschlagplatz memorial, an enclosure in white marble, with an entrance topped by a black semi-circle resembling a tombstone. Unlike the Ghetto Heroes monument, the Umschlagplatz is designed as a small, contemplative space.
Memorial to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
Memorial Route of the Jewish Martyrdom and Struggle in Warsaw.
Memorial at the Umschlagplatz in Warsaw.
Other Sites
Many towns and cities have dedicated Holocaust memorials. Some mark locations of actual events or significant sites. Other memorials commemorate the victims of National Socialism in a more general way.
Holocaust memorial at Yad Vashem.
Memorial to the Warsaw Uprising.
More memorials to Janusz Korczak.
Memorials to homosexual victims.
Holocaust memorial in Paris (Mémorial des Martyrs de la Déporation).
Holocaust memorial art in Hamburg, Germany.
Sculpture group in a Berlin park commemorating Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
Sculpture group in Berlin marking the location of the former Jewish cemetery.
Photo of the Avenue of the Righteous Gentiles, a Yad Vashem memorial to the righteous Gentiles.
The Children's Memorial at Yad Vashem by architect Moshe Safdie is hollowed out from an underground cavern.
In the Hall of Remembrance at Yad Vashem an eternal flame remains lit in memory of those who died in the Holocaust.
The Palm Springs Holocaust Memorial includes seven figures mounted on a double-tiered Star of David 20 feet across.
Color photos of Palm Springs Holocaust Memorial and statement by the sculptor, Dee Clements.
Personal Responses
Survivors, witnesses, and others touched by the Holocaust have created many personal works of art as they struggle to comprehend this tragedy.
Drawings and paintings by David Olère, a camp survivor.
Stuart N. R. Wolfe's installation of Figuren gegen das Vergessen (Figures against Forgetting) at Ravensbrück Women's Camp.
A special exhibition of ten photographs of former Ravensbrück Camp prisoners.
Josef Elgurt, a survivor of Nazi ghettos, recalls his experience in the drawing, In Memory of the Holocaust.
The Legacy Project is building an archive of images related to the major historical tragedies of the 20th century. From this link you can find many Holocaust artworks by selecting "Holocaust" from the "Event" dropdown menu. This is also a useful link for comparing art created in response to the Holocaust with art created in response to other major targedies.
An interview with Art Spiegelman, creator of Maus. He chose the form of a graphic novel for the story of his parents' survival of the Holocaust. The two-volume book won a Pulitzer Prize. It was exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1992.
Maus Resources on the Web: scholarly articles, interviews, exhibits, reviews, and creative work inspired by Maus.
Indifference: an online Holocaust art exhibit featuring four paintings by Fritz Hirschberger, a Jew, who was forced out of Germany prior to World War II.
Haunting Memory, a triptych by R.A. Beecroft
uses digitally altered historic photographs of the Holocaust.
Read about "Wings Of Witness," a Holocaust memorial sculpture being constructed by thousands of youth nationally incorporating 11 million soda can tabs under the direction of artist Jeffrey Schrier.
Propaganda
The Allies also produced propaganda during the war. The following gallery contains artwork by Ben Shahn, Thomas Hart Benton, and Lawrence B. Smith.
Four Allied propaganda posters warning of the Nazi threat.
A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust
Produced by the Florida Center for Instructional Technology,
College of Education, University of South Florida © 1997-2013.