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Painting Depicting Violation Of Human Rights

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  • How can human rights violation be explained through a painting ?

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                        Human Laundry, Belsen: April 1945

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Creator: DORİS ZİNKEİSEN

Paıntıng name ıs : Human Laundry

Production date:  1945-04-01

Place of exhıbıtıon: IMPERIOL WAR MUSEUM

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In 1944 Zinkeisen was commissioned by the Red Cross and St John War Organisation to record their work in north-west Europe, and was one of the few women war artists to be sent overseas

On 15 April 1945 British soldiers entered Bergen-Belsen concentration camp to find a scene of absolute horror. Ten thousand corpses lay unburied, and around 60,000 starving and sick people were packed into the camp's barracks without food or water.

Doris Zinkeisen arrived soon afterwards.This work he created after the came namely Human Laundry is arguably the most powerful work produced by any of the artists who were present.

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FROM ZİNKEİSEN'S VİEW 

  • Zinkeisen wrote ‘the stable was used to wash any living creature down before sending them into hospital to be treated.
  • Each stall had a table on which to lay the patient – the German prisoners did the washing.
  • The church was used as a hospital for those that were alive.’
  • Zinkeisen was one of many volunteers who witnessed the horror of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

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Marc Barham's Analysis

''From start to finish it was about process. Doris Zinkeisen has captured that here.

The same process that will save lives here, was used to murder millions.

But the bestiality of such acts does not become less evident.

The transition to hospital takes place in a Stable Blocks which were converted into improvised decontamination facilities.

The imprisoned people have replaced the animals. ''

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  • In her painting, to the very left, is what looks like a piece of dark coloured drapery hung across the entrance, with the purpose I assume, to provide some sort of makeshift privacy.
  • An attempt at such normality does seem rather perverse given the horror of what was taking place. However, a piece of drapery would surely not hang like that. So the more I look at it, the more it seems to me to take on the features of a face, a darkly totemic face of anger and hate.

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           WHAT DID ZİNKEİSEN WANT TO SAY?

  • Zinkeisen finds an effective motive in the contrast between the well fed, rounded bodies of the German medical staff and the emaciated bodies of their patients. 

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Which Human Rights Have Been Violated?

  • All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.(art1)

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  • Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status  (art2)

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  • No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.(art5)

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  • No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.(art9)