Europe will be Stunned: Visualization of Jewish Return
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Abstract
This article seeks to trace how visions of a “Jewish return to Europe” inform contemporary cultural production. I am particularly interested in asking how the presence of Israeli émigrés in Germany, a dramatic instance of such a “return,” challenges the country’s memorial culture due to the “exportation” of dispositions relating to the Holocaust construed in Israel. I view this dislocation of memo-rial practices, a new instance of Hebrew-German exchange, as embedded in a broader discourse on migration, integration and xenophobic violence. At the core of my argument is the 2007–2011 film trilogy
And Europe Will Be Stunned,
directed by Israeli artist Yael Bartana, who is based in Berlin and Amsterdam. The trilogy presents a fictional national movement that advocates the return of 3,300,000 Jews to Poland, with the claim that Poland’s ethnic and religious homogeneity is a deficiency that could be corrected with the renewal of Jewish life in the country. Wearing the form of an enthusiastic political manifesto, the trilogy mirrors early Zionist images and motifs in articulating the vision of the return to the homeland. The trilogy’s end reveals this endeavor as a failure, to which the assassination of the movement’s leader, Slawek, attests.
And Europe Will Be Stunned,
directed by Israeli artist Yael Bartana, who is based in Berlin and Amsterdam. The trilogy presents a fictional national movement that advocates the return of 3,300,000 Jews to Poland, with the claim that Poland’s ethnic and religious homogeneity is a deficiency that could be corrected with the renewal of Jewish life in the country. Wearing the form of an enthusiastic political manifesto, the trilogy mirrors early Zionist images and motifs in articulating the vision of the return to the homeland. The trilogy’s end reveals this endeavor as a failure, to which the assassination of the movement’s leader, Slawek, attests.
Topics
Main Topic: Holocaust and Memorial Memory Diaspora Israeli Expatriates Jewish Film Jewish Arts Jewish Culture
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6
Page Number / Article Number
197-209
ISBN/ISSN
978-3-11-047338-4
Link
PDF (via academia.edu), Europe will be Stunned: Visualization of Jewish Return
Bibliographic Information
Europe will be Stunned: Visualization of Jewish Return. . 2018: 197-209. https://archive.jpr.org.uk/object-eur173
