The mobilization of women during the war was unprecedented. Yet their place in resistance movements, like the reality of Jewish resistance, has long been ignored. The exhibition proposed by the Memorial with Casterman Editions does them justice.
This exhibition was presented from 8 March to 23 October at the Shoah Memorial
The publication by Casterman editions of a series of albums dedicated to women in resistance during the Second World War, the latest opus of which is devoted to the French resistance fighter Mila Racine, offers the opportunity to pay tribute to Jewish resistance fighters while celebrating the vitality of graphic and editorial creation in historical comics.
These women fought against the enemy, both in France and in occupied Europe, the concentration camps and killing centers.
Composed of many original archival documents and photographs, sixty objects and comic strips, this exhibition produced in partnership with Casterman draws a portrait of these women without whom, according to the quote of Henri Rol-Tanguy, "Half of our work would have been impossible."
In their vast majority, the resistants have deployed an activity that does not involve either clandestinity or even an apparent break with expectations related to their gender. Defense of the values of democracy, rejection of anti-Semitism and xenophobia, desire to save people under threat... were the common points of their commitment, itself specific by its precocity, its spontaneity, and its anchoring in the heart of the home.
In view of the political and legal status of women, as well as their previous low level of activism, this mobilization was unprecedented. Yet the place of women in all the movements of the Resistance, and the place of specifically Jewish Resistance in this same whole, have long been underestimated, or ignored.
In partnership with
Sophie Nagiscarde, Caroline François
Philippe Boukara, historian, Catherine Lacour-Astol, PhD in contemporary history, member of the Center for the History of Resistance and Deportation, Michelle Perrot, professor emeritus, Emmanuelle Polack, art historian.
Lior Lalieu-Smadja, Caroline Didi and Cécile Fontaine, photo library of the Shoah Memorial. Karen Taieb, Cécile Lauvergeon and Marie Lainez, archives of the Shoah Memorial.
Exhibition coordination team assisted by Ludivine Hebert.
