WARSAW GHETTO SERIES

During World War II, Władysław Brzosko lived in Warsaw, Poland. In April 1943 he witnessed the drama of the Warsaw ghetto destruction and a heroic battle of its Jewish insurgents.  In 1960 he emigrated to the United States and devoted the next ten years to working on his monumental "Warsaw Ghetto Series." 

The series consists of four large oil canvases: Composition Blue, Korczak, Composition Yellow and the Umschlagplatz; and hundreds of accompanying sketches in a variety of techniques. In his ghetto paintings the composition, the form, and the color are all equally important and work in unison to convey the drama of this historical moment. The paintings are reminiscent of the large battle compositions created by the great masters of the Renaissance. The form shows close affinity with the Cubists and Futurists and the color is striking in its potency and complexity. The charcoal and watercolor preparatory sketches reveal not only a serious search for aesthetic solutions but also stand on their own as independent works of art.

In the "Warsaw Ghetto Series," Brzosko created a powerful tribute to the people who perished in the Warsaw ghetto and offered a unique vision within the genre of Holocaust art. The series was exhibited in the Herzl Institute in New York City in 1967, at Middlebury College in Vermont in 2008, and in several Jewish centers across the United States. Presently a selection from the series is on display at the Holocaust Memorial Center in Farmington Hills, Michigan.