Itamar Gov’s exhibition Terugblik (Retrospect) revolved around a public sculpture, placed in the Amstel station in Amsterdam in 1939 and standing there ever since. The starting point of the project was a box containing 250 unseen photographs taken in 1941-1942 that were discovered during renovation works at an Amsterdam attic in 2010. The photographs, depicting arrests of Jewish inhabitants of Amsterdam, inspections, raids on Jewish stores, and the removal of street signs carrying Jewish names, were taken by the photographer Bart de Kok, who was commissioned by the Dutch authorities. One photograph shows a crowd of Jews at the Amstel station who would imminently be transported to the Molengoot camp and from there to concentration camps in Poland. They are standing around a sculpture of a naked woman, Terugblik. Outlining the disinterest of the stone witness, the exhibition depicted the empty look of Terugblik against hundreds of moments that she had to observe since the day she was placed in the Amstel station, such as when the Jewish Amsterdammers were being deported. The exhibition was on view at puntWG Amsterdam from September 16 to 25.

https://puntwg.nl/en/terugblik-retrospect

Image: Itamar Gov, Terugblik - Retrospect, 2022