Those Who Had No Shoes- A Work for Remembrance
Photographed Above is the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin, Germany
“Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it” – An aphorism perhaps most famously attributed to Sir Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the Second World War – however, reiterated throughout the annals of History by a plethora of orators, statesmen, philosophers, and the like. Despite its plentitude of recurrences – the Paradigm remains no less veritable. This maxim, however, holds a particularly compelling role pertaining to its gravity in the present day. Perhaps the most salient manifestation of this aphorism, however, can be internalized by humanity at its worst – of course, I am alluding to the despotic evils of historic Genocides and ethnically, religiously, and/or racially driven persecution. When discussing the atrocities that have been immortalized due to their infamy, alongside the millions who suffered from them – it is often petrifying, even nauseating to even attempt to internalize not only the myriad of mass atrocities and oppression throughout history, but also the sheer scale, impact, and barbarity so prevalent throughout the history of man – therefore it is quintessential for us to address the matter with a combination of delicacy and vehement moral conviction –– especially given the urgency of remembering the past amidst rising sectarian conflict the world over.
Furthermore, it is often a near Sisyphean task to symbolize and internalize the sheer magnitude of past atrocities and their impact upon humanity – however in my opinion, perhaps one of the most nonplussing ways to do so is through art. Therefore, in order to commemorate and immortalize the millions who suffered through and in many cases were lost to human depravity – to those who were lost to genocide, I have created this piece of artwork, resembling a human foot –to symbolize those who had no shoes, the innumerable victims of historical atrocities. Constructing this foot, was a very painstaking, emotional process for me, as it was a grim reminder of my own family’s history of persecution and being the victims of genocide – 16 of my ancestors, family members; European Ashkenazi Jews – were lost to the Holocaust, alongside immeasurable additional emotional loss, on my mother’s side. Meanwhile, on my father’s side, my great uncle had served in the American Army during WWII on the Pacific front, and lost a leg in a Japanese P.O.W. Camp – so making a work of art testifying to the evils of fascism and genocide was no easy task for me. When constructing the project, I was also reminded of my maternal great-grandfather in particular, Eliyahu – born in Austria, he had lost nearly his entire family in the Holocaust and fought in the British Army in WWII, before later assisting in the foundation of the State of Israel. This barefoot, with its withered scars and Calluses, symbolizes the immense struggle and pain undergone by those who had no shoes, the victims of human oppression and tyranny, the victims of barbarism. However, despite being primarily focused upon the Holocaust and the cataclysms unleashed upon man by fascism, this testament is in no way limited nor restricted solely to the Holocaust, but rather to the myriad of historical malfeasance, depravity, and despotic cases of discriminatory, murderous oppression throughout the centuries.
Whether it be the Armenian Genocide, Slavery in the Americas, the Japanese genocide of millions throughout Asia in WWII, the religious and ethnic massacres by extremist, fundamentalist movements from every corner of the world, Manifest Destiny, the slaughter of countless millions during the Imperialist era, and wider sectarian discrimination in general. I chose the Holocaust in particular as the main purpose as it is a true exemplification of humanity at its worst – irrefutably the most brutal, most cataclysmic, most depraved genocide in human history, and due to the veracity of rising Antisemitism and Neo-Fascism the world over, is an important issue today in society, especially in America with rising polarization akin to the kind experienced in Weimar Germany during the 1920s. I believe that the foot symbolizes, in a way, the suffering of my ancestors and oppressed peoples of all races – as epitomized by the variation of color. These people, innocent of any wrongdoing – were deprived of the bare necessities of life, that we so often take for granted, such as shoes, or more fundamental matters such as food, shelter, or human dignity. Because of this veracity, so often forgotten in the 21st Century, the message holds a loftier weight today than ever before. No matter where your ancestry originates from, the message is nonetheless that of a quintessential axiom for human history and for our future to remember humanity at her worst in yesterday’s gone, so we can be at our best in tomorrow’s soon-to-come. It is that visceral awareness, that understanding of tragedy and the barbarity of humanity historically that enables the embedding of civilization today in the face of the rising tides of Neo-Fascism – and it is that civility, that sense of honor, duty, and justice, a commitment to the fellowship of humanity and learning from history, that makes us not merely homo sapiens, but truly human.
