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Charlotte Salomon, Self-Portrait, 1939-1941, oil crayon on paper
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An exhibition in Paris reviews the work of artist Charlotte Salomon, who fought to live for her art in the face of Nazism and persecution.
“Life? Or Theatre?” could also be entitled “Art or Death”. The vast art collection that consists of 1,325 gouache paintings was built up in the space of just two years between 1940 and 1942 after Charlotte discovered that a large part of her family had committed suicide.
Despite the fact that her uncle tried to convince her to end her life, she chose for life and through that, art.
The work is both autobiographical and historical. Salomon presents her life as a theatrical piece and mixes quotes from songs, extracts from poems and philosophical references.
Following the tradition of the Singspiel, the predecessor of the operetta, “Life? Or Theatre?” is divided into three parts: a prelude, a main part, and an epilogue.
The prelude is devoted primarily to exquisitely detailed scenes from Charlotte’s childhood. The main part of the play features the people who most affected her life. She tries to penetrate the essence of each of her main figures and also explores her ideas about art and the soul. The epilogue centres on her life on the Cote d’Azur.
The style of painting evolves as the exhibition proceeds: the first paintings about her childhood are delightfully colourful but gradually the paintings become more and more abstract as her state of mind darkens
.
Exile forms a key theme throughout the exhibition as Salomon comments: People became too much for me to bear and I to immerse myself in solitude, far from everyone.”
A tragic life
Born in Berlin in 1917, Salomon grew up among the Jewish upper middle class. In 1935, she enrolled in the Berlin art school. Four years later she left Berlin to go in hiding with her grandparents in Villefranche-sur-Mer and Nice in France.
The same year, she learnt of her family’s tragic destiny. Soon after, Charlotte and her grandfather were imprisoned in the French camp of Gurs. Her grandfather’s advanced age meant that they were soon released, returning to Nice where Charlotte started painting.
Between 1940 and 1942, she painted more than 1,300 gouaches that make up the collection “Life? Or Theatre?”. In 1943 her parents were arrested in Amsterdam where they had gone into hiding. They were transferred to the Westerbork camp in Holland and managed to survive the Holocaust.
The same year, Charlotte married an Austrian Jew, Alexander Nagler, who took care of Jewish children. When German troops arrived in the south of France, Charlotte gave her work to a French friend with the words: “Take good care of them. They are my whole life.”
Soon after, Charlotte, who was pregnant, was sent to Auschwitz with her husband. She was probably murdered the day she arrived. In 1971, her parents donated the art collection “Life? Or Theatre?” to Amsterdam’s Joods Historisch Museum, where it is still kept today.
During the period of the exhibition, the Paris Jewish Museum will organise conferences, lectures and film screenings about Charlotte Salomon.
The exhibition “Leben? Oder Theater?» runs until 21 May in the Musee d’art et d’histoire du Judaisme, 71 rue du Temple, 75003 Paris. Tel: 00 33 1 53 01 86 53
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