Under assumed identities, a two-year-old girl named Ingrid Deutsch and her grandmother, Regina Braunstein, had spent 18 months in hiding with a Catholic family in Florenville, a town in the Belgian province of Luxembourg. The two had had no word of Ingrid’s parents, Fela and Carol Deutsch, for over a year. In the last postcard he sent, for Ingrid’s fourth birthday in the winter of 1943, Carol had written, “Father is very proud that his Ingrid is being such a good, sweet little girl. Love and kisses, Daddy.” Carol and Fela were detained by the Gestapo and sent to the Mechelen transit camp.
Ingrid and Regina returned home to Antwerp in early 1945, after Belgium had been completely liberated from German occupation. A long time passed before they obtained information about Ingrid’s parents. The tidings were bitter: Fela and Carol Deutsch had been deported on Transport B22 in September 1943 from Mechelen to Auschwitz, where Fela was murdered. Carol was transferred to Sachsenhausen and from there to Buchenwald. He died of exhaustion in Buchenwald's subcamp, Ohrdruf, on December 20, 1944.
When Regina and her granddaughter arrived at their apartment on Consciencestraat, they discovered that the Nazis had confiscated their furniture and valuables as part of the Möbelaktion, a campaign of systematic looting designed to transfer stolen Jewish property to German hands. However, miraculously one item was left untouched: a large, meticulously crafted, wooden box adorned with a Star of David and a seven-branched menorah. The box’s Hebrew and English inscription testified to its contents: a collection of biblical illustrations labored over by the artist Carol Deutsch during a period of 12 months between 1941 and 1942. Under the stressful conditions of curfew and persecution, the artist had produced an oeuvre that proudly affirmed his Jewish identity—a patrimony he devoted to his young daughter.
The 99 strikingly painted gouaches depict the biblical scenes with a unique iconography and palette, reflecting the artist’s boldness and originality. The illustrations combine Art Nouveau ornamentation with stylistic influences of the Bezalel School, echoes of Deutsch’s 1936 visit to the Land of Israel. In contrast to many other European artists, Deutsch places his biblical figures in their native settings, illuminated by the special light of the Holy Land.
Carol Deutsch was a disciple of the well-known Belgian painter James Ensor, and was particularly noted for his portraiture and townscapes executed in a naïve style. In his youth, Deutsch had received an Orthodox Jewish education. Before the German occupation, he had served as president of the Jewish community in the seaside resort of Oostende, on Belgium’s northern coast. Recently tracked-down letters suggest that Deutsch, in the framework of his official duties, doggedly strove to preserve Jewish tradition and strengthen Jewish education.
The biblical series found in the Antwerp apartment was Deutsch’s most significant work on Jewish themes. The paintings abound in subjects, symbols and motifs drawn from Jewish sources, and reflect a deep commitment to the tradition of Torah study at the literal, exegetic and mystical levels.
The biblical illustrations Deutsch bequeathed to his daughter exhibit exceptional vitality and constitute a stalwart expression of defiance to everything for which the Nazis stood. This father’s intimate and intellectual bequest to his daughter, donated to and displayed at Yad Vashem’s Museum of Holocaust Art, is thus instilled in the collective legacy. Here, visitors can appreciate the illustrations’ artistic quality first hand and grasp the power of the Jewish spirit and tradition that inspired them.
Yad Vashem published a luxurious portfolio of Deutsch’s biblical illustrations, with the generous support of Mikhail Bezelianski
First published in Yad Vashem Jerusalem magazine, #47, Fall 2007
