Jul 242012
Land’s End
Legion of Honor
Holocaust Memorial by George Segal
Time has taken its’ toll on this memorial. The hand on the man above was not to touch the wire as they were electrified.
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This memorial shows ten figures sprawled, recalling post-war photographs of the camps. Placement of this work was controversial. The choice to look over such a truly beautiful landscape recalling death in a rather graphic way was not acceptable to many. The artist however, insisted that the viewer might consider death while facing towards the monument and life while facing towards the Golden Gate.Segal’s work is executed in bronze and painted white. It has been the subject of grafitti, but Segal mentioned, at a 1998 conference at Notre Dame University, that he did not find this a problem since grafitti was a reminder that problems of prejudice have not been solved.
Segal’s ensemble of bodies is not random. One can find a “Christ-like” figure in the assemblage, reflecting on the Jewishness of Jesus, as well as a woman holding an apple, a reflection on the idea of original sin and the biblical connection between Jews and Christians, and raising the question of this relationship during the Holocaust.
The essential figure of the man standing at the fence is probably derived from Margaret Bourke-White’s famous Life Magazine 1945 photograph of the liberation of Buchenwald.
Another plaster version of Segal’s “The Holocaust” can be found at The Jewish Museum in New York.
George Segal (November 26, 1924 – June 9, 2000) was an American painter and sculptor associated with the Pop Art movement. He was presented with a National Medal of Arts in 1999.
Although Segal started his art career as a painter, his best known works are cast lifesize figures and the tableaux the figures inhabited. In place of traditional casting techniques, Segal pioneered the use of plaster bandages (plaster-impregnated gauze strips designed for making orthopedic casts) as a sculptural medium. In this process, he first wrapped a model with bandages in sections, then removed the hardened forms and put them back together with more plaster to form a hollow shell. These forms were not used as molds; the shell itself became the final sculpture, including the rough texture of the bandages. Initially, Segal kept the sculptures stark white, but a few years later he began painting them, usually in bright monochrome colors. Eventually he started having the final forms cast in bronze, sometimes patinated white to resemble the original plaster.
I am a very big fan of Segal’s work being moved to tears while standing in front of his “Bread Line” sculpture at the FDR Memorial in Washington D.C..
While these are at the Johnson Atelier. Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton, NJ so the background is different they are the same figures as the FDR Memorial.
A somber reminder.
This is so powerful! It reminds me of the memorial at the slave market in Zanzibar. Human kind has a lot to be ashamed of.
I’m a big fan of his too. Incredibly moving piece!
Its visual stunning but somber all in one. Thank you for sharing.
Powerful memorial which I’ve not yet seen in person. Thanks for the background info.
Very touching! I love the FDR memorial in DC too!
What a powerful monument. I got chills just looking at your photos.
I have seen this memorial and it is quite moving, but I missed the hidden meanings of the sprawled figures.
This is amazingly moving. Something very imbedded in me these memories. I remember the first time I looked at LOOK magazine. I have never forgotten.
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