The Holocaust Museum and Cohen Education Center, which celebrates its 25th anniversary in Naples this year, opens with a commanding presence as you approach the first gallery: a permanent sculpture by former Naples resident and artist Henry Schiowitz. Our arts editor, Emma Witmer, counts the piece, titled Real People… Real Numbers, among her favorite local sculptures. “The composition is simple and beautiful, but it tells a nuanced, deeply human story,” she says.
Two decades ago, Henry received a phone call from Simon Bergson, chairman of Poland’s Auschwitz Jewish Center Foundation (AJCF), who wanted to commission a sculpture for the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the largest Nazi extermination camp, Konzentrationslager Auschwitz. “No, no. I really don’t do that kind of work,” Henry told Simon, the artist’s mind turning to images of suffering and brutality. But as Simon talked about his parents, Milton and Nadzia, whom he intended to honor with the artwork, Henry’s thinking shifted. “You’re the result of survivors, so I think that’s the best approach,’” the artist told him.
Rather than bearing witness to suffering, Henry focused on what survivors carried forward—hope, love and the instinct to hold on. Cast in bronze, the sculpture depicts two left arms gripping each other by the shoulder, their muscles flexing and veins popping in a fervent embrace. The interlocked form registers first, then the forearms and the numbers carved into them. “If you take the tattoos away, it’s just two lovers,” Henry says.
Photography by Brian Tietz
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He created five editions, one of which was installed at the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland last year. The original model remains at AJCF, and the Naples version has resided in the museum since 2008, mounted against a wall of more than 300 names honoring local escapees, concentration camp survivors and their descendants. Each individual named shaped the museum’s mission and programming, through donations, artifacts or early hands-on work, setting up displays. “While they might not have all had the Auschwitz tattoo, all their stories are important to us,” museum curator Cody Rademacher says.
To him, the sculpture reflects not only people’s reliance on one another to overcome suffering, but also how that connection carries forward: “Most survivors were kind enough to give up their stories, allowing [the sculpture’s message] to reach across generations.”