facing survival
Holocaust Museum Houston's new exhibit showcases haunting portraits
Survivor Martin Greenfield displays his concentration camp tattoo
Holocaust Museum Houston is hosting a beautiful and stirring show of Holocaust survivor portraits by David Kassan called Facing Survival. It will be open to the public starting July 12.
“While a picture captures a moment in time, a portrait captures the undeniable spirit of the subject matter,” said Linda Burger, interim CEO of Holocaust Museum Houston, in a statement. “The art of David Kassan communicates in a purely visual language that extends beyond the survivor’s verbal and written word. Kassan's combination of portrait art and testimony will leave an indelible mark on all who experience it.”
Kassan’s work is remarkable. His portraits are incredibly photorealistic and scaled 1:1 with the subjects, making each piece appear like a window directly into the person’s life. This series, in particular, is breathtaking. Survivors appear in the infamous striped pajamas of the death camps or displaying their tattooed numbers given by the Nazis.
All are presented against mixed light and dark abstract backgrounds that add a contextual holiness to the paintings, almost as if they were memories coming forward to demand the viewer never forget. Compelling and haunting, it helps keep the human face of the Third Reich’s atrocities in the public mind even as living memory fades.
Kassan is known for his intricate creation process. He filmed the survivors telling their stories and developed his final work from numerous sketches. In this way, the paintings indeed show the spirit of those who survived.
One portrait in particular will be familiar to Houstonians with historical interest in the Holocaust. Kassan painted local Holocaust survivor Ruth Steinfeld. She and her sister, Lea, were deported to the Gurs camp in the French Pyrenees in 1940. The camp had been established a year earlier for political prisoners, but it soon housed Jews once the collaborative Vichy government was under the control of the occupying Germans.
The sisters were eventually placed in the care of the OEuvre de Secours aux Enfants (OSE) and made it to Houston after the war. Steinfeld’s portrait shows her holding the French Legion of Honor medal she received in 2021 for her long career teaching young people about the Holocaust. Her parents died in Auschwitz in 1942.
Facing Survival will run through January 5, 2025. It is presented in part with grants from the Houston Arts Alliance as well as the Humanities Texas and National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ronald Grabois Family Endowment Fund. The exhibit is included with general admission. Tickets can be purchased at the museum’s website.
