In Hebrew, 18 is “chai,” meaning life, and
Holocaust Museum Houston’s upcoming exhibition
“Life: “Survivor Portraits” servesasanexplorationand
a celebration of the lives that Houston-area survivors
of theHolocaust have created for themselves.
Beginning on June 26, 2014, during the Museum’s
18th anniversary year, this new series by local artist
Kelly Lee Webeck will include 18 portraits of local
survivors and 18 images that document the home
space each survivor has created. The exhibit will
include36gelatin silver prints.
To increase the exhibit’s interactivity, broaden
accessibility andextend its reachbeyond thephysical
and temporal exhibit, two iPadswill include additional
images not shown on the walls. Through the use of
technology, these images, and the 36 images in the
show will be available through the iPad technology
utilized in theMuseum’sDigital Trunkprogram.On the
digital screens, the photographs can be viewed and
used in classrooms and other community spaces to
continue the inquiry begun in the exhibit space.
InWebeck’swords:
“IhaveworkedwithHolocaustMuseumHoustonsince
2007, when I began photographically documenting
the Warren Fellowship for Future Teachers. Since
then, I have found myself becoming close to the
survivor community. In 2010, I envisioned a project
and wrote to several survivors I had come to know
and care about, asking if anyone would be willing
to participate in this portrait photography project.
“Inmany cases, I had listened to survivors talk about
their experiences during theHolocaust; often, I heard
their stories numerous times. I wondered what their
lives were like when not in the Holocaust museum
setting. I yearned toseewhere they lived,what lifewas
likewhen they were at home. As part of the project, I
went to their homesandasked tosee thespaces they
had created for themselves.
“I have always been interested in the objects people
choose to surround themselves with and how the
spaces people create become a part of their identity.
The time I spendwith survivors, making images, is not
about testimony or war. It is about the lives they have
created for themselves since thewar; it is about who
andhow they are in their home space. I think portraits
could be equivalent to a visual testimony, and for me,
these images, made on film, offer moments of quiet
reflection. In my subjects’ homes, I find spaces and
moments that speak of identity, memory and passion.
There are stories that canbe learned through reading
the lines in their faces andobserving the objects they
surround themselves with, the things that are special
to them, mostly acquired in the years after thewar.”
Life: Survivor Portraits
Spring2014 /
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