Façades

Façades, 2000

Edward Hillel

The word "Façade" refers to surfaces or illusions. While exposing something, a façade often camouflages or hides something else. I have produced two photographic series entitled Façades. The first (1997) confronted the memory of Nazism in Berlin. This series Façades (2002) are photographic diptychs that explore contemporary Europe and the Holocaust to highlight two human realities that confront each other: our capacities to violence and racism, and our need for beauty, ideas and tolerance.

My intention with both series of the Façades photographs is two-fold:

  1. To project dormant historical archives into contemporary art discourse - and by doing do so keep the memory of the Holocaust alive.
  2. To engage viewers to think about their own role/responsibility in looking at images and interpreting what they see and how they see.

The series Façades (dyptichs) evolved in the process of my accumulating two parallel archives: collecting historical photographs from World War II  and the Holocaust, while traveling around Europe photographing its beautiful monuments, landscapes and creations. Each diptych brings together one image from each group. The contemporary photographs are interpreted in brilliant glossy color chromes while the historical monochrome photographs are digitally printed on mirror-like mylar material. The viewer sees himself and others reflect and disappear inside these life-size images.  The outdoors may reflect in through gallery windows, as do other elements present in the exhibition space, bringing in the immediate environment into play. The viewer is suspended between the power and beauty of the image surface and the difficult emotions of its content, as he becomes a participant-observer in a refractive game of presence and absence, remembering and forgetting.

The Façades (dyptichs) series are comprised of 11 photographs,

Many of the titles originated from other languages and have cultural references (Paris By Night is the title of a photography book by Brassai; The Red and the Black is the name of a Stendahl novel; Boat On the Water is the title of a French lullaby; Left, Right (selective fade) is a cinematic term…)

Photographs (2), (3), (4), (9). (10) and (11) are presently available as chromogenic and mylar diptych prints, dimension approx. 52 x 76 inches, mounted on aluminum in 4" thick dark oak wood frames.

The Façades have never been seen in the United States.

They  have been shown in Europe (Rotterdam Photography Biennale 2000; National Gallery of Prague 2001). In 2004-2005  four Façades will be shown on billboards across Europe in a multilingual campaign sponsored by the International Auschwitz Committee and the Remembrance Foundation.  Entitled "Which Europe?" It will commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Holocaust.

The complete series is also available in a small gallery size, images 8 x 10 inches, matted and framed in 16 x 20 inch frames.