As a young girl, Emmie Arbel survived the Ravensbrück and Bergen-Belsen concentration camps. David Schaffer escaped the genocide in Transnistria because he refused to follow the rules. The brothers Nico and Rolf Kamp, separated from their parents, were hidden from their killers by the Dutch resistance in 13 different locations. Only a few Holocaust survivors are still alive today. This makes the recording of their memories a matter of central importance. The multifaceted project ABER ICH LEBE (But I Am Alive) approached this task in an unusual way: it created graphic stories for which there were virtually no documentary sources. In close dialogue with the four survivors, the internationally renowned illustrators Miriam Libicki (Vancouver, Canada), Gilad Seliktar (Pardes Hanna-Karkur, Israel), and Barbara Yelin (Munich) created a graphic reconstruction of their memories. These encounters gave rise to comics that explore, through illustration, the themes of trauma, memory, and survival. The resulting anthology ABER ICH LEBE, edited by Prof. Dr. Charlotte Schallié (University of Victoria, Canada), and the exhibition challenge conventional ways of seeing and images of the Holocaust. The stories visualize an incomprehensible event in an immediate and moving way, while simultaneously creating a new archive of memory for future generations. The medium of comics proves to be a powerful tool for reconstructing what has not been visually documented, offering a plausible, subjective, and as truthful as possible narrative beyond photorealistic depiction. Using original drawings, sketches, archival material, and interviews with participants, the exhibition also sheds light on the book’s creation process.

The exhibition was curated by Barbara Yelin and Jakob Hoffmann. It was created in cooperation with the Stadtmuseum Erlangen and the Comic-Salon Erlangen.