Beyond the local discourse: Re-thinking the Israeli-Jewish "Hitler-wave"

Noga Stiassny*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Hitlerwelle, Führerboom, Hitlernostalgie in the German language; in Hebrew there is the famous La'Hit-Ler (Hitler-Schlager) coined by Israeli poet David Avidan, or what Professor Moshe Zuckermann has just recently called Hitleriada (a combination between Hitler and Olympiad ):1 all phrases share the wish to describe the great interest that people often (re-)find in the figure of the Nazi Führer. And this interest usually emerges in waves. During the 1990s, Israeli art showed an obsessive preoccupation with the figure of Hitler that lasted around a decade and is considered to be a turning point with respect to the ways the Holocaust is represented among Israeli-Jewish artists. By focusing on the work of Israeli artist Boaz Arad, Marcel Marcel (2000), which ended this decade, in comparison to the work of German artist Rudolf Herz, ZUGZWANG (1995), this essay wishes to re-think the recruiting of the image of Hitler in Israeli art, in order to introduce the advantages of transnationalism and a comparative approach to the local art discourse with respect to Holocaust related imagery.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)118-141
Number of pages24
JournalIsrael Studies
Volume23
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jun 2018
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

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© 2018 Indiana University. All rights reserved.

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