Icons of Loss: Angels and the Warsaw Boy of Samuel Bak
The Florida Holocaust Museum is pleased to present international artist Samuel Bak and the premiere of his newest works: Icons of Loss: Angels and the Warsaw Boy of Samuel Bak. The exhibition, which features large scale surrealistic artworks, studies and sketches, is made up of two series created by the artist and opened on November 1, 2009 and ran through April 25, 2010.
Holocaust survivor Samuel Bak has painted a series of works based on Albrecht Dürer’s Melencholia, dealing with the Holocaust and the absence of God. The vibrant paintings uses similar imagery to that used in Durer’s etching, however, altered to raise questions about an “enlightened” society which allowed the Holocaust to occur, survival and God’s failure to halt the killing of so many innocent lives. The other series included in the exhibition is based on the now infamous photograph of a young boy with arms raised taken during a roundup of Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto. (In this series), I reflect on the countless millions of children that perish in man’s senseless conflicts, wars and genocides – past and present. What an unacceptable abuse of the innocents, of the just ones!” says artist, Samuel Bak.