Dessins de Mauthausen – “Drawings from Mauthausen” by Edmond Goergen, published by Éditions Cercle d’Art, Paris, 1975 – signed and numbered copy: no. 457 (from a limited edition of 500 copies). The drawings, made by Goergen in the camp, are accompanied by his own descriptions and document the horrors of Mauthausen. Introduction by Raymond Hallery.
An illustrated booklet featuring a series of drawings by Edmond Goergen, a former prisoner of the Mauthausen concentration camp. The drawings were made inside the camp itself and depict the horrors of the camps: the infamous stone quarry at the base of the notorious “Stairs of Death, ” emaciated prisoners, the brutal living conditions, violence, suffering, and the moments of terror and despair experienced by the inmates. The drawings are accompanied by French texts written by Goergen himself, in which he recounts in detail the horrific experiences he and his fellow prisoners endured. For example: “During Gestapo interrogations, the son was forced to beat his father, the father to betray his son. The kapos were murdered with stools, the SS with clubs. Pairs of men, bound in iron, stood at attention for days on end in front of misted windows, waiting for death to pass. Prisoners recaptured after escape attempts were thrown to the dogs, then shot… they were hanged… they were beaten… the corpses fell with a dull thud we wish we had never heard…”. In another chilling passage: “Do you remember that night of suicides? A Pole slashed his wrists, two other comrades hanged themselves on the rafters of the barracks. In the infirmary block, there was chaos because a man dead revived by the heat of the crematorium oven, rushed into the barracks, half-roasted, screaming, writhing in pain…”. Each drawing is dated within the image, created between 1944–1945.
Edmond Goergen [1914–2000]: Luxembourgish painter, draftsman, and resistance fighter. After studying in Luxembourg, he worked as a high-frequency technician from 1934 to 1943. During World War II, he served in the German army (LVL) and secretly used his profession to establish regular radio contact between Luxembourg and the Allied forces. Among other things, he transmitted the first reports on the German A4 rocket preparations in Peenemünde. On December 14, 1943, Goergen was arrested by the Germans and briefly imprisoned in Hinzert, then transferred to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp until 1944, and subsequently to the Mauthausen concentration camp until liberation. It was there that he created the drawings presented in this work.
The horrific period in the concentration camp changed his life. As a young man, he had been an accomplished athlete, holding the Luxembourg youth record in javelin throw—but the years in the camps severely damaged his health. After the war, he studied painting at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts, where he joined French painter Bernard Buffet. In 1948, Edmond Goergen returned to Luxembourg, where he received several important commissions for the restoration of historic art, including in the church of Monnerich, the fresco of Jean-Georges Weiser, and mural paintings in the churches of Rindschleiden and Junglinster, as well as other churches in Eisleck. During these years, he became head of the National Restoration Service and curator for the National Sites and Monuments Service.
[66] pages. 30 cm. Very good condition.
