Flowers in a Vase
Object numberM2005/043
TitleFlowers in a Vase
DescriptionFlowers in a Vase, a collage of coloured paper scraps and tempera paint on ledger paper made by Kitty Passerova, aged 12 in Theresienstadt Ghetto, c1942.
Kitty was 12 when she was sent from Prague to Theresienstadt in January 1942 with her mother and stepfather. She was one of 15,000 children who passed through the ghetto.
While living in the girls home L410 in Theresienstadt, Kitty received art lessons from Friedl Dicker Brandeis, an artist and textile designer who had studied at the Bauhaus school in Germany. Friedl encouraged children in the ghetto to create art as a way to understand their emotions and their environment and how to appreciate beauty. On 6 October 1944 Friedl was transported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered two days later. Only Kitty and her mother survived - after being transported to Auschwitz they were sent as labourers to Germany where they were liberated by the Russians in May 1945. Kitty came to Australia at the age of 19.
Through the efforts of then Prime Minister Paul Keating, the artwork was repatriated to Kitty in 1997 following the 1994 exhibition 'Children of the Holocaust' at the Australian War Memorial and the Sydney Jewish Museum.
Kitty was 12 when she was sent from Prague to Theresienstadt in January 1942 with her mother and stepfather. She was one of 15,000 children who passed through the ghetto.
While living in the girls home L410 in Theresienstadt, Kitty received art lessons from Friedl Dicker Brandeis, an artist and textile designer who had studied at the Bauhaus school in Germany. Friedl encouraged children in the ghetto to create art as a way to understand their emotions and their environment and how to appreciate beauty. On 6 October 1944 Friedl was transported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered two days later. Only Kitty and her mother survived - after being transported to Auschwitz they were sent as labourers to Germany where they were liberated by the Russians in May 1945. Kitty came to Australia at the age of 19.
Through the efforts of then Prime Minister Paul Keating, the artwork was repatriated to Kitty in 1997 following the 1994 exhibition 'Children of the Holocaust' at the Australian War Memorial and the Sydney Jewish Museum.
Production placeTheresienstadt ghetto
Production date 1942 - 1943
Subjectchildren, holocaust art, resistance
Object namecollages
Materialpaper
Dimensions
- width: 200.00 mm
height: 280.00 mm
Credit lineSydney Jewish Museum Collection, Donated by Kitty Levy