Memory is discontinuous narrative/subject to editing/elision/errors
This is where "facts" can be disputed by participants,witnesses and bystanders
The central theme of our 20th century was two world wars-
and the central symbols of those wars were Verdun and the Marne in WW1
Dresden and Tokyo firebombings ,Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic devastations
and the Holocaust of gypsies,academics,homosexuals,
To render these factual events in art requires more than Guernica
Newsreels fail to convey the corruption of humanity that continues to this day
If painting and film fail-what artforms can encompass necessary imaginative leaps?
Novels(by Thomas Keneally etc) fictionalize and tend to mythologize for plot purposes,
as did SCHINDLER's LIST and endless war dramas (Dam Busters,Bridge at Navarone,PT109 etc)
Fiction fails too,like every pulp spy potboiler or B grade black and white feature
Graphic novels expose the visual to metaphor and symbol
casting characters as in ANIMAL FARM(best conveyed as a cartoon movie)
as animals like cat and mouse.Facts supplement personal storytelling
Accuracy essential.Holocaust as Holy Grail of tales.Survivor's stories apocryphal.
The theme still exceeds all media-every survivor has tattoos ,scars and stories to share
Perhaps a cumulative mode of museums,artifacts,cartoons,
books,movies and fictionalized extrapolations will be necessary
for us to assimilate all the memories we have suppressed-before they arise again
on a scale too huge to fit within our art.
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