Israeli Holocaust Memorial Strategies at Yad Vashem: From Silence to Recognition

Abstract

Yad Vashem is the living site of Israeli national Holocaust memory, where every generation of Israelis adds another memorial to an evolving landscape. The memorials installed from 1953 until the late 1970s are either figural or minimalist in style and focus on the fighters, heroes, and martyrs of the Holocaust. Those installed since the 1980s, in contrast, tend to be conceptual or installation-oriented, often employing visual strategies of absence and disorientation—what one may call postmodern approaches—and are dedicated to the victims and survivors of the Holocaust. This essay traces the development of memorials at Yad Vashem in relation to changes in Israeli attitudes toward the Holocaust, survivors, and their traumas: from silence and shame to understanding and even sympathy.1 At stake is the potential for memorials to provide a framework for trauma in visual form.2