Transcultural engagement with Polish memory of the Holocaust while watching Leszek Wosiewicz.pdf (456.61 kB)
Transcultural engagement with Polish memory of the Holocaust while watching Leszek Wosiewicz's Kornblumenblau
journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-09, 02:54 authored by Victoria Grace WaldenKornblumenblau (Leszek Wosiewicz 1989) is a film that explores the experience of a Polish political prisoner interned at Auschwitz I. It particularly foregrounds issues related to Polish-Jewish relations during the Holocaust in its diegesis. Holocaust films are often discussed in relation to representation and the cultural specificity of their production context. However, this paper suggests thinking about film and topographies, the theme of this issue, not in relation to where a work is produced but in regards to the spectatorial space. It adopts a phenomenological approach to consider how, despite Kornblumenblau's particularly Polish themes, it might address the transcultural spectator and draw attention to the broader difficulties one faces when attempting to remember the Holocaust. Influenced particularly by the writing of Jennifer M. Barker and Laura U. Marks, this paper suggests that film possesses a body ¬¬- a display of intentionality, beyond those presented within the diegesis, which engages in dialogue with the spectator. During the experience of viewing Kornblumenblau, this filmic corporeality draws attention to the difficulties of confronting the Holocaust in particularly haptic ways, as the film points to the unreliability of visual historical sources, relates abject sensations to concentrationary spaces and breaks down as it confronts the scene of the gas chamber.
History
Publication status
- Published
File Version
- Accepted version
Journal
Holocaust Studies: A Journal of Culture and HistoryISSN
1750-4902Publisher
Taylor & FrancisExternal DOI
Issue
2-3Volume
22Page range
256-273Department affiliated with
- Media and Film Publications
Full text available
- Yes
Peer reviewed?
- Yes
Legacy Posted Date
2016-09-15First Open Access (FOA) Date
2017-09-05First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date
2016-09-15Usage metrics
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