Comments on: danny ghitis – land of os https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/ burn is an online feature for emerging photographers worldwide. burn is curated by magnum photographer david alan harvey. Wed, 07 Sep 2016 08:31:01 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.4 By: GodDamnCobras https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-86182 Wed, 09 Mar 2011 06:10:42 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-86182 […] BURN Magazine […]

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By: david bowen https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-83154 Thu, 20 Jan 2011 08:42:08 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-83154 yesyes.. i’m all for never-forgetting, yet something about a great effort to remember the past seems to negate the need to think about the now.. remembering a past cruelty is not really enough..
if it is in the present that actions need to be analyzed i wonder to what degree remembering the holocaust serves to blind us from present atrocities.. the intention is to remember so that it can not happen again, yet it’s important to remember that is has happened again just as it had happened before to both greater and lesser degrees.. 60 million native americans or hundreds of thousands in the middle east.

great set of photos which bring the heavy atmosphere of the town to the fore.. fresh approach..
i went ‘holocaust’ in 1992 photographing the camps across poland and, as with other place-names which live in infamy, the heavy heavy air is in part due to the throngs of people drawn to feel the place where mass death occurred.
monuments to hatred are needed i think.. no monument is greater than a decaying relic.. the ww1 trenches of verdun.. the ww11 atlantic wall stretching from norway to france.. the carcasses of russian tanks which litter afghanistan.

i could not imagine living at oświęcim any more than any of us could imagine the terror of experiencing our species capability for hatred.
for me, living alongside these relics is better understood through these photos.

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By: yospyn https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-83146 Wed, 19 Jan 2011 22:48:23 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-83146 Danny – I took a train from Wrocław to Oświęcim a few months ago, then walked to Auschwitz. You absolutely nailed this essay. Love it. For me, it was weird to walk through regular town life so close to hallowed ground. Whether it’s shame, guilt, sadness…something is still in the air there. It was oddly quiet at times, until you get to the museum parking lot(s). Then it’s tourist central.

I wonder if you have an image off Wyzwolenia road of a basketball court covered over with grass?

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By: robstothard https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82607 Sun, 09 Jan 2011 20:45:07 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82607 Great series Danny. I agree with an earlier comment that
any project that reminds us of such atrocities worthwhile. Being
able to deal with a personal issue and make great images in same
the process is excellent.

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By: robstothard https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82606 Sun, 09 Jan 2011 20:45:07 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82606 Great series Danny. I agree with an earlier comment that
any project that reminds us of such atrocities worthwhile. Being
able to deal with a personal issue and make great images in same
the process is excellent.

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By: bob black https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82410 Thu, 06 Jan 2011 02:50:33 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82410 Charlotte Salomon…..Primo Levy….Jean Avery…..anne frank…elie wiesel..paul celan’s parents…bruno schultz…irene nemirovsky…max jacob…

how does one begin to describe…

without mythologizing their own work in the face of the reality….

and while anti-semitism was a large part of Poland (still is) as it is through the world, I respect that you are trying to humanize the city, to try to pull the weight of those perfectly designed horror castles and machinery off the shoulders of the land and the people still living their…to humanize the people, the poles, who too often bare the brunt of the atrocity as their town their lives are still shad0w-shamed by that work factory death house(s)…

for that, i want to ask then: why not even avoid dealing directly with the work/death camps and instead focus only on the lives of the people living there….

i’m still trying to figure this out (myself) as a photographer/writer…for that I applaud not only your effort and your desire to re-see that town as a town of the living rather than as a museum culpable for horror….

but, my brain at the moment is just too jet lagged to write more…

so much i want to write ….but i’m spent….

so instead of a long comment, i’ll leave you with the work of one of my heroes…

christian boltanski

his is of course on approach….but, i also thing, another is to go the opposite…rather than memorialize, to celebrate the lives that continue, working in the shadows of those places cannot be easy for anyone…

congratulations on being published and for producing thoughtful, sensitive work

http://www.google.ca/images?um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=380&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&biw=1436&bih=826&tbs=isch%3A1&sa=1&q=christian+boltanski&aq=f&aqi=g8&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=

i’ll try to write something in a few days…

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By: mark g https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82074 Wed, 29 Dec 2010 21:20:09 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82074 ‘The thing that gets me, that I keep going back to, that I can’t understand or let go of, is how dispassionate so much of the Holocaust was. I can understand people getting all worked up, passions taking over, people being whipped into a frenzy, that frenzy gaining momentum, culminating in villagers brandishing knives and machetes. It’s emotional. It’s primal. It’s immediate. What I don’t get is the dispassionate bureaucracy, the architecture of the Holocaust-the logistical planning: transporting human livestock efficiently, more expedient system for gassing larger numbers, bespectacled pedantic little turds sitting behind gray desks dotting i’s, crossing t’s, moving widgets around.’

Primo Levi’s writings are very enlightening: ‘If This Is A Man’, ‘The Periodic Table’, the essays (and also the poetry). Levi rejected the idea that the Russian Gulag and the Nazi Lager were equivalent, and considered the Nazi system unique in history. I imagine such dispassionate bureaucracy was possible because, as a result of Hitler’s relentless propaganda, youth camps, etc., Jews came to be considered worse than vermin (they had already been regarded with suspicion anyway). In the eyes of the brainwashed, they were human cattle, and so the transportation and eventual ‘final solution’ became merely logistical problems: bureaucracy bred more bureaucracy, all of which functioned as an efficient means of further dehumanisation. Not that that really explains anything at all; far from it.

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By: mw https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82057 Wed, 29 Dec 2010 16:16:54 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82057 I’m sorry, but I agree with John Gladdy, at least until he implies that the images have weight once the words are included, which I still don’t see. Girl rides horse 15 minutes from Auschwitz? I think for this to work, the photographs would need to communicate the historical horror with no words at all, neither captions nor on signs visible in the pictures. In an essay like this, I don’t want to be told what to feel. I want to feel it through the power of the image.

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By: monkeypoint https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82053 Wed, 29 Dec 2010 15:17:41 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82053 Danny, what can possibly be a better testimony to the strength of your essay than the fact that it kept someone up at night.

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By: marcin luczkowski https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82043 Wed, 29 Dec 2010 07:19:53 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82043 My last comment has been written in hurry. I hope it not sounds like I have bad feelings about Germany. It is contrary. I am just not good in diplomacy. Wen I was a little I was play with my friends to polish solders (heroes brave) and germans (nobody wanted play evil Germans and they always die) after many years Poland and Germany become closest friends. I mean in all polls we like germans most from all nations. After hundreds of years of wars after WWII our best friend is our oldest enemy. What is just great in my opinion. Even if in many buildings there are still traces of bullets. I think sometimes looking back is not a good adviser. I am glad we are best friends now.

But I will not tell anyone how he should see or feel history. Like with this essay. If it helps someone to understand something, anything, something important, I will support it with open heart. It is not my business.

For Danny it was personal project, and I see it by subjective glasses. That’s why I did not understood the essay. The images are really good. But I just see polish village. Regular one. It could be everywhere in poland. I could say nothing special. Yes the place are not regular. But I just feel like they been used as a tool in someones fight. Fight for history.

For most people holocaust is unbelievable trauma. The same as rwanda, turkey or cambodia and many other places.
And for me Israeli-Palestinian or US-Iraq and holocaust are equal. It is even equal with murder during robbery. For me in Auschwitz die one million single people. I prefer think that way.

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By: Danny Ghitis https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82034 Wed, 29 Dec 2010 02:44:25 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82034 Thanks for the brilliant reflections everyone. The variety of reactions are helping me process the work in a new light. I feel like I could respond to everyone at length (but don’t worry I wont!)

monkeypoint – I’m sorry to hear you lost sleep over this…I also lost many nights of sleep thinking about this stuff. It’s just such a profound part of Jewish identity that it takes a lot of energy to confront. In the end living in Oswiecim was very therapeutic, and helped me see the Holocaust beyond traumatic personal impact and more as a broader human theme. Unfortunately as time passes this subject becomes oversimplified in discussion, leaving many of us with nothing but horrific black and white images on the brain…The discussion about how the Holocaust affects Israeli politics nowadays is interesting and extremely complicated, but I think it’s inappropriate to compare the Israeli-Palestinian or US-Iraq conflicts with the Holocaust. The mechanisms are entirely different. Perhaps Rwanda, Bosnia, Cambodia, etc. where millions are sentenced to death because of their race/religion…
p.s. congrats on the solo show!

marcin and aga – You’re right, Poland definitely suffered tremendously at the hands of the Nazis. Arguably more than any other country. The main reason being that Poland was a haven for the Jewish people for about 800 years (on and off), thus the perfect place for Germany to conduct genocide. Non-Jewish Poles bore the brunt of that trauma as it took place in their backyards, and hundreds of thousands ended up dying in the same concentration camps as Jews. There is much to be discussed, though, about how much Jews were truly accepted in Poland in the first place… In any case, Poland’s history and collective memory is so layered that past and present constantly collide.

cttobin – Thanks for your on-point insight and for posting that link. I highly recommend that reading to anyone who is interested in this subject.

Ed – The Soviets so-called preservation of Holocaust sites was a propaganda tool in many cases, so Poland would remember it was “saved.” Signs at Auschwitz did not even mention Jews until the 80s, despite the fact they represented 91% of the victims.

Panos – I think pride is what often leads to irrational acts, but patriotism can be rational. The problem is when people create their own definition of patriotism and it becomes exclusionary, fervent nationalism, where your country/people are superior to others. I’m patriotic about America, for example, because of its progressive tenets – freedom of speech, equal rights, balance of power, etc, etc

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By: monkeypoint https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82025 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 23:09:52 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82025 Brian: exactly.
DAH! I bought a one way ticket to Mexico! Leaving January 14 and making my way to the northern border.
P.S.-today I was offered a solo show, opening in April! I would keep plugging away because I’m compelled to take these photos, but honestly, since the OBX workshop, I’ve NEVER been more focused, determined, and motivated. I hear your voice in my head. Wax on, wax off grasshopper.

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By: Brian Frank https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82019 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 21:52:33 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82019 “Given the right circumstances, we will behave in predictable ways and allow ourselves to be manipulated in the name of pride, ethnicity, and xenophobia.”
-mokeypoint

That sounds much like the USA of today, just as much as the love of uniforms, parades and flag waving that you pointed out.

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By: david alan harvey https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82009 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 21:20:22 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82009 MONKEYPOINT…

Michelle…brilliant…i am going to make you do a photography book AND absolutely force you to write one..

cheers, david

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By: monkeypoint https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-82007 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 21:10:40 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-82007 I kept going back to this essay for days and then I had a knee-jerk reaction, commented emotionally instead of thinking it through, which kept me up last night. Marcin, when I think Holocaust, I think GERMANY = epicenter and the confluence of factors and events leading to a perfect shitstorm: the humiliation of Versailles, the economic recession, Germany’s militaristic culture, it’s love of uniforms and flags and parades (many disturbing similarities in the US of A), Hitler’s bad hair style. I’m not interested in a pissing contest over who’s the biggest loser, waiving a banner of victimhood, embracing it as some identity molding cultural tic. Jews were victims then. They are now in the position to victimize. The thing that gets me, that I keep going back to, that I can’t understand or let go of, is how dispassionate so much of the Holocaust was. I can understand people getting all worked up, passions taking over, people being whipped into a frenzy, that frenzy gaining momentum, culminating in villagers brandishing knives and machetes. It’s emotional. It’s primal. It’s immediate. What I don’t get is the dispassionate bureaucracy, the architecture of the Holocaust-the logistical planning: transporting human livestock efficiently, more expedient system for gassing larger numbers, bespectacled pedantic little turds sitting behind gray desks dotting i’s, crossing t’s, moving widgets around. Ironic: that kind of banality took some imagination. Then how about after the war ended? The Jews weren’t exactly welcomed back with open arms. Maybe the international community should have put more focus and energy on reconciliation and repatriation, instead of creating a homeland on land that was already home to another tribe. Let’s face it: the Brits certainly made a mess of things on several chunks of the globe.

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By: mimi mollica https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-81993 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 16:24:04 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-81993 First of all I must say that these pictures are very beautiful and the essay strongly evocative. I find this story compelling and extremely intelligent.

On the front of Poland, Germany, Israel and the Holocaust I must say that if on the one hand I totally agree that people in general should not feel guilty for the wrongs inflicted by their parents or grandparents, on the other hand though, WWII and its atrocities are not that far in time. Only about 60 years have passed and humans are know to forget history very quickly indeed. So, if Danny is offering us yet another reminder of what has been going on in Poland during WWII and he’s putting this in a contemporary perspective through his photography, I think he is only doing good.

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By: Valery Rizzo https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-81990 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 15:36:37 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-81990 wow…great work, great photographer.

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By: Artisan S https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-81983 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 11:12:44 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-81983 In Holland most of the WOII prison camps were reused after te war (after housing repatriated people from Indonesia). And as we are a prudent people the baracks were simply sold off . They served for instance as chicken sheds up to recently. Then last year, someone remembered that Kamp Westerbork (a kamp from which the Dutch Jews were deported) had once existed and sheds were repurchased and are now lovingly restored into a few baracks to remember. By the way, the Dutch had kept good records about the wereabouts of the Jewish population and these records fell into German hands (sheer stupidity or on purpose is disputed). You can image that this was greatly appreciated.

In that respect one can only respect what the Polish did by keeping the memory alive, not only via monuments and remembrence days (as we did) but by keeping the places of horror intakt for all to see in order to serve as lasting memento not to commit these crimes again. The irony is that this was done under Soviet rule, and you only have to read through 1500 pages of Gulag Archipelago, to know that prison camps and death camps were also part of the fabric of everyday life.

I think this series (but only when you read the subtext) excelently portrays the normality of life we take for granted even in the direct shadow of a death camp. But normality of life should never be taken for granted, we should always be on allert for signs of terror (or even intollerance) towards groups of people. Whether they are part of different religion, a different “race” (quotationmarks because people biologically all belong to the same race), a different political believe or a different lifestyle. We should recognise that words like nation, state, people etc. refer to arbitrary devisions, which have no prepresentation what soever in the population. I’m a mishmash of German, Italiën, Swiss, French and even Romanian genes as we all are. Hitler was proud to be a German but he had Somalians, Berbers and Askenazian Jews among in his line of heritage. And another Dutch sprayblond politician who prides himself to be Dutch and who stands intollerant towards the Muslim faith, well he has an Indonesian grandmother (and yes Indonesia is the biggest Muslim country in the world).

So what I see in these pictures is everyday life still taken for granted……but only single man has to stand up and these ordinary people will turn themselves into slaves, and thus are willing machines which can commit the biggest atrocities. Germans, Dutchmen, Englishmen, Turks or Americans that does not matter. These pictures speak to me of vigilance, of not taking for granted liberties but to fight for them on an everyday basis, in every conversation were you hear intollerance being uttered, never to turn away, always to confront.

Greetings, Ed Kuipers

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By: marcin luczkowski https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-81977 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 07:25:44 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-81977 monkeypoint

I will be the last who will deny polish antisemitic before WWII and After that. I know what happen in Jedwabne and many others places.
I write my comment because like you see in statement there are words holocaust Auschwitz one word Nazi, and a few Poland, and no word Germany.
Polish historians fight for divide this two words Poland and Holocaust because only the territory is sole thing common. And very soon and even now in US newspapers holocaust is named “polish extermination camp”
and thats why I was so afflicted by this statement.

I have no time to write now. I only have to add, Thomas souls not have feelings of guilt. Thomas, you did nothing wrong. If I write that Germany committed genocide I want to say that white is white. Nazi was not an aliens from the stars, it was Germany nation. But right now it have to nothing common with this country. History is history for all nations. All nations have the sin.

must run

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By: cttobin https://www.burnmagazine.org/essays/2010/12/danny-ghitis-land-of-os/#comment-81976 Tue, 28 Dec 2010 05:31:30 +0000 http://www.burnmagazine.org/?p=7934#comment-81976 A great (wordy and academic) look at this theme, called
“Negotiating with the Dead”, On
 the 
Past
 of
Auschwitz 
and
 the

Present
 of
 Oświęcim.
http://www.psychologyandsociety.ppsis.cam.ac.uk/__assets/__original/2010/08/Andriani_Manning.pdf
And I completely forgot to say: job very well done Danny Ghitis.
I’m impressed.

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