'In the liveliest place, my mother's bosom, there was death' – mother-daughter relationships in the work of Rachel Nemesh, Second-Generation Holocaust survivor. Issue 1 (2nd January 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Marnin-Distelfeld, Shahar
• Is Part Of: Holocaust studies. Volume 28:Issue 1(2022)
• Page Start: 20
• Page End: 47
• Publication Date: 2022-01-02
• Subjects: Holocaust art -- Second-Generation art -- feminist art -- mother-daughter relationship -- Israeli art; Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945) -- Study and teaching -- Periodicals; 940.5318
• DOI: 10.1080/17504902.2021.1882770
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1750-4902

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This article focuses on the artwork of Israeli artist, Rachel Nemesh, a Second-Generation Holocaust Survivor. The assemblage to be discussed was exhibited in her solo exhibition, One Flesh, in 2020. The corpus analysis will be divided into four themes: (a) The Big Mother – works describing the elderly mother of Nemesh in a monumental manner; (b) Pieta versions – works focusing on bodily scenes of mother and daughter closely tangled; (c) Body-Parts: works showing randomly detached body organs; (d) Domestic Space – the artist's mother in her home. The study will be framed by two main fields: art centering on the Holocaust and feminist ideas focusing on mother-daughter relationships. Theoretical and visual examination will be enhanced by interviews with the artist aiming at profoundly decoding her artwork, claimed to resonate a feminine artistic language. An attempt to formulate an original interpretation of Holocaust Second-Generation's art, combined with a feminist point of view, will be made here. Rachel Nemesh's artwork is being investigated here for the very first time.