Bowdoin College Museum of Art | - Mound of Human Ash, Majdanek Concentration Camp, Poland

Preview image of work. gelatin silver print from infra-red negative, Mound of Human Ash, Majdanek Concentration Camp, Poland 11034

1992.33

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Mound of Human Ash, Majdanek Concentration Camp, Poland

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Artist

Judy Ellis Glickman (20th century - )

Title

Mound of Human Ash, Majdanek Concentration Camp, Poland

Creation Date

1990

Century

20th century

Dimensions

9 1/4 in. x 12 3/4 in. (23.5 cm. x 32.39 cm.)

Classification

Photographs

Creation Place

North America, United States

Medium and Support

gelatin silver print from infra-red negative

Credit Line

Gift of Judy Ellis Glickman

Copyright

This artwork may be under copyright. For further information, please consult the Museum’s Copyright Terms and Conditions.

Accession Number

1992.33

Majdanek, another concentration camp in this region, was the first to be discovered and liberated by Allied forces and today remains one of the best-preserved sites of its kind. Lauder’s use of infrared film renders dark masses as menacing, overbearing presences, suggesting the unrepresentable weight of history. What is the ethical and political responsibility of humanity in the face of an irreversible past? In 1959, the German critical theorist Theodor Adorno asserted: “To write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric.” Adorno, struck by the fact that the “progress” of civilization had not prevented the horror of the Holocaust, was like many others consumed by this philosophical paradox. How could art and culture ever find a language to express a reality that was so horrific as to be nearly inconceivable?