Exemplaire Signé.
Anna Arendt est né en République démocratique allemande. Elle avait 24 ans lorsque le Mur est tombé, sa fille avait 2 ans. Ses parents sont nés en 1940 en Allemagne, enfants de guerre. Ses deux grands-pères étaient des soldats qui avaient été en Pologne entre 1940 et 1942. L’un est revenu 2 ans après la fin de la guerre, l’autre n’est jamais revenu. Plus tard, Anna Arendt a découvert que le père de son mari, le photographe Sid Grossman, venait de la région en Pologne où ses deux grands-pères ont été envoyés pendant la guerre.
Enfant, elle a trouvé une étagère secrète contenant des albums de photos de sa famille. « C’est là que j’ai découvert le pouvoir d’une image. Photo prise à l’été 1940. Une jeune famille, ma grand-mère, son bébé et mon grand-père en uniforme allemand. Une image pleine de contradictions, porteuse de sentiments ambivalents jusqu’à aujourd’hui.”
Photographiée principalement entre l’Allemagne et la Pologne depuis plus de 15 ans, l’œuvre glisse dans le temps comme un souvenir sanglant. Marcher nu dans la forêt sombre, des loups qui tournent en rond et hurlent. Une fille qui devient une mère qui devient une grand-mère qui devient un enfant. Des villages hantés et des âmes en danger. La dure réalité du passé se mêle harmonieusement à des moments d’extase qui semblent tirés d’un conte de fées des frères Grimm.
Vanishing est une représentation inoubliable de la façon dont la beauté et la brutalité coexistent dans le cœur des hommes et des bêtes.
Signed Copy.
Anna Arendt was born in the German Democratic Republic. She was 24 when The Wall fell, her daughter was 2. Her parents were born 1940 in Germany, children of war. Both of her grandfathers had been soldiers, who had been in Poland between 1940 and 1942. One came back 2 years after the war was over, the other one never returned. Arendt later discovered that her husband’s father, photographer Sid Grossman’s family came from the area in Poland that her two grandfathers were sent during the war.
As a child, she found a secret shelf that contained photo albums of her family. “It is where I discovered the power of a picture. A picture taken in summer 1940. A young family, my grandmother, her baby and my grandfather in a German uniform. A picture full of contradictions, carrying ambivalent feelings even until today.”
Photographed mostly between Germany and Poland over 15 years, the work slides back and forth through time like a blood memory. Walking naked through the dark forest, wolves circling, howling. A daughter becoming a mother becoming a grandmother becoming a child. Haunted villages, and souls in jeopardy. The harsh reality of the past merges seamlessly with moments of rapture that feel plucked from a Grimm fairy tale.
Vanishing is an unforgettable depiction of how beauty and brutality coexist in the hearts of men and beasts.
From the Artist:
My name is Anna Arendt.
But that isn’t the name my parents gave me when I was born.
I was born and spent my life in the German Democratic Republic.
It was a dictatorship. Many of us lived in fear.
The Stasi was everywhere.
I was 24 when the Wall fell.
My daughter was 2.
The Stasi was dissolved.
But the fear remains.
Both my parents were born 1940 in Germany.
Both children of war.
My grandfathers had been soldiers.
Both had been in Poland between 1940 and 1941.
One came back 2 years after the war was over.
The other one never came back home.
I remember the faces of my grandmothers, my mother, my father when I asked questions about the war. I remember this first as a child, later as a young woman, then as a mother, and now as a grandmother myself. There were no answers. Only silence and tears.
As a child I found a way to open a secret shelf that contained photo albums of my family. This is where I discovered the power of a picture. A picture taken in summer 1940. A young family, my grandmother, her baby and my grandfather in a German uniform. A picture full of contradictions, carrying ambivalent feelings even until today.
My husband’s father was Sid Grossman.
His family came from an area in Poland that once was part of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire.
This was the same area my grandfathers were sent during the war.
For more than 15 years I traveled to these places both our families had been.
I walked through cities and villages, forests and what was left of the concentration camps.
Lodz, Wrozlaw, Warsawa, the Forests around Nowy Dwor, Białystok, Lublin, Krakow, Oświęcim, Katowice, Bytom.
I saw Treblinka, Sobibor, Majdanek and Auschwitz.
During this time I photographed strangers on my journeys and my family and friends back home in Berlin.
I photographed my friend Antje giving birth. I photographed her and her daughter, together full of joy. And I photographed Antjie’s last days on earth, only four years later.
I photographed tenderness and intimate moments of love with my husband, Adam. And I photographed his mother, Miriam, as she was passing away in New York, only one month before Adam and I married.
For how long exists memory?
All those years, a whole century and even longer passed by.
Like a butterfly on a summer day arrives on a flower and in a blink of an eye it disappears.
But our skin carries memory, the stones do, the trees, the air, the rain and our tears carry memory.
When the world seems broken, I go to the forest.
I like wolves, crows and deer.
Looking into the eyes of a wild animal reminds me about reality.
About beauty and brutality.
Making pictures is my way to move on.
