End of Tumbalalaika
20"x 24"x 4", 2004, Collage, printed silk, yarn, mirrors, acrylic paint on wood
David Feinberg, with drawing and painting contributions from Lucy Smith, survivor, and the following artists: Laura Krueger, Katie Novak, and Diane Grace Goodman.
Lucy made the drawings in response to word associations. The drawing on the right depicts a hiding place in the ghetto, where many people crowded into a small space behind a false wall while a gendarme searched the area with a menacing dog. The mirrored surfaces multiply the image of the gendarme, reflecting Lucy's fear of the ever-present threat of police who appeared around every corner.
The drawing on the left is a singer who performed in a small apartment where Lucy, her mother, and the singer lived in Tarnow (1940-1941). One day, the singer wore a fancy dress and shawl, and she sang a song called Tumbalalaika. Lucy describes the first time she heard this song: "The Jews could not participate in any public performance, neither as performers nor as audience. We created our own performances at our homes and that is how I heard, for the first time, the song Tumbalalaika. I did hear some music and songs during the rest of the war, but not the Yiddish music."
Lucy initially made the candelabra to signify a Channukah menorah, and brought a small chain to use with it. After working with the chain in many ways, we finally discarded the chain in favor of the thread line (lower right). While we had no preconceived idea about the significance of the thread line, we discovered that it conveyed a sense of barriers and the isolation of ghettoization.
The above is captured on video in the documentary, Voice to Vision 2: Women Survivors Reveal Holocaust Experiences through Art. Produced by David Feinberg, Stephen Feinstein, Director, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, University of Minnesota, and Vicente Caro, videographer.