Documentation of Persecuted Jewish Artists

The research focus of JDCRP includes an exploration of the lives of persecuted Jewish visual artists, many of whom made an outsized contribution to artistic milieus throughout Europe during their tragically abbreviated careers. Numerous Jewish artists perished in the Holocaust, while the lives and art of those who survived was ineluctably changed by their traumatic experiences. Few of their works were catalogued, while many of the objects disappeared, were stolen, or destroyed. Often it is the records of Nazi looting that provide the only existing information on their works.

The Jewish Digital Cultural Recovery Project Foundation has launched a project to provide documentation of the life and artistic works of these persecuted Jewish artists, creating a virtual reconstruction of a once vibrant artistic culture. The project builds on existing database and published information, centralizing and collecting information from numerous countries. It compiles information from multiple sources, including archives, bibliographies, oral history, and museums, reconstructing the lives of these artists, and reversing the attempt by the Nazis and their collaborators to obliterate their memory and artistic legacy.

The presentation digitally links such personal biographical information to enable a broader understanding of the locations, influences and contacts that informed the work of these artists. The thriving cultural world of European art attracted numerous Jewish artists who crisscrossed the continent to study and work, enriching the cultural influences on modern European art. The compilation creates a significantly broader understanding of the importance of the Jewish contribution to European nineteenth- and early twentieth-century visual arts.

At a later stage, the JDCRP Foundation will stimulate research on various other branches of the arts, to recapture the lives and legacies of these largely forgotten other Jewish artists, allowing their contribution to be reintegrated both into Jewish and European cultural history of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Support by the David Berg Foundation for the initial research and development of the list is gratefully acknowledged, as is additional support by the German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (BKM) and the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany (Claims Conference) for a second phase of enhancement and expansion of the list.

Please note that the following Initial List Documenting Persecuted Jewish Artists is an ongoing research project. We are appreciative of suggestions made regarding adjustments to entries, as well as additional information not yet on the list. Please contact ariela.braunschweig@jdcrp.org or info@jdcrp.org.

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last updated April 2025