“An Embroider Strata Of Memory” – Second Generation Holocaust Survivor
The work is composed of seven round embroidery frames, on which the works are stretched. Three of the frames contain oil paintings in which the sky peeps through the treetops. Two frames show embroidered childhood photographs of me and my family,and the other two display photographs of my father with a group of people.
The work is composed of seven round embroidery frames, on which the works are stretched. Three of the frames contain oil paintings in which the sky peeps through the treetops. Two frames show embroidered childhood photographs of me and my family,and the other two display photographs of my father with a group of people.
The work began with an embroidery of my family members. I am standing between my parents in the Yarkon Park, in a pose which was carefully positioned by the photographer. I, a seven year old girl, my father sixty three, and my mother fourty seven. The careful planning of the photographer (being used to presenting many families) was unable to disguise the uniqueness of my small family. A lonely girl, between two parents who could have been her grandparents, immaculately dressed, as if they were on an outing in a
park in Europe, and not here in Tel Aviv.
The embroidery was done with a simple thread, on elegant tablecloth material, and placed in an embroidery frame. Both the cloth and the frame reflect for me the European bourgeoisie, the orderliness, the fine taste, the desire to reflect a beautiful normal family – but the reality is not to be seen in the picture – there is no family
here, there is an attempt to create one. I embroider, sew, stitch the images, – touch, knot and place the work in a frame.
In the second embroidery – I am portrayed dressed as Queen Esther, together with my father in Dizengoff center, again posing for the photographer. I embroider and then undo it, leaving the holes made by the needle. The oil paintings are made from photographs I took in the Yarkon Park, in the same spot where the photographer had photographed many years before. My father has died, I have my own family,and the trees are still standing in the same place, with the sky reflecting between the leaves. I have often thought of how people live, work, create and die, while nature remains – the mountains, the sea and the trees, bearing witness to all man’s creations, be they
good or bad.
My father’s pictures displayed in the hoops were discovered after his death. At the back of the pictures,in clear and orderly handwriting the story unfolded –”me accompanying refugees and helping them steal across the border from Austria to Italy” and the other – “me and a group from Salzburg”.
The people are no longer alive, nor is their story, but the A lps Muantains stands in their place.
The size of 5 of the hoops is 24cms. diameter. 2 hoops are 20 cms. diameter.
Technique – oil on material, embroidery on material, prints.
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