A synoptic portrait of Sally Perel, the Hitler Youth Salomon
At what point can each of us identify with racism and murderous thoughts? Can you be a victim and an oppressor at the same time? Is it possible to get rid of the fascism that surrounds us? “Jupp became a stalwart Hitler Youth. Sally feared Jupp. He was a deadly enemy! But to survive Sally had to become his own enemy. Jupp the Nazi has never left me.” Sally Perel
Sally (Salomon) Perel, was born in Peine, Germany, in 1925 as the son of an orthodox rabbi. When the Nazis came to power, Salomon eventually ended up in a Soviet orphanage, but when the German Reich invaded Russia he was taken prisoner. The captors began to shoot Jews and Communists. He saved himself from execution with a lie, claiming to be a Volksdeutscher, or ethnic German. He gave himself the name Jupp (Josef) and joined a tank unit as an interpreter, until the unit commandant offered to adopt him after the “final victory.” He had no choice but to accept and was sent to an élite Hitler Youth school in Germany, where he trained to become a Hitler Youth leader, in constant fear of being discovered as a Jew, and in growing inner conflict. His story became the basis for the award-winning movie ‘Europa, Europa’.
The video installation 4 x Sally presents two interviews with Perel in German and two in Hebrew, in both cases once with the Jew and once with Jupp, the Hitler Youth. All four interviews run simultaneously, demonstrating and visualizing Perel’s conflicting personalities and the space in between. The work is part of the project Two Family Archives by the Austrian artist Friedemann Derschmidt and the Israeli artist Shimon Lev, which investigates the feasibility of dialogue between descendants of perpetrators, victims, and followers. Salomon Perel is one of the few people to incorporate all three aspects in one person: “I was a perpetrator and victim in one.”
On Tuesday, July 11, 2017, 19:00-20:30, was a Public Performance and discussion with Sally Perel, Friedemann Derschmidt, and Shimon Lev
4 x Sally will be presented
Monday-Thursday July 10-13, 2017
10:00-19:00
Friday, July 14, 2017
9:00-14:00
At the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute,
43 Jabotinsky St., Tel. 02-5605222
The video installation is presented within the workshop/conference:
Nationalism in the History of the Holocaust, Genocide, and Mass Violence
at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute