"Julia Pirotte, photographer and resistance fighter"
"People ask me how I use this device to capture images that are exhibited around the world (...). When I feel a heartbeat, I know it will be a good photo." – Julia Pirotte
Julia Pirotte, born Golda Perla Diament on 26 August 1907, grew up between Końskowola and Lublin in Poland in a poor Jewish family; her father was a minor. Arrested at the age of 17 for her involvement in the Polish Communist Youth, she spent four years in prison. In 1934, helped by the organization of International Red Aid, she fled her country to join her sister Mindla, a refugee in France.
Falling ill, she stopped in Belgium where she worked as a worker and married the trade unionist Jean Pirotte. In Brussels, she attended evening classes at the journalism school and also took a course in photography. In 1938 and 1939, she carried out her first missions as a photo-journalist: an investigation on the Polish miners in Charleroi for a trade union magazine and a report in the Baltic countries for the press agency Foto WARO.
In May 1940, following the invasion of Belgium by Nazi Germany, she took the path of exodus. With comrades met during the trip, she decided to settle in Marseille because of the factories present in the city. She began working in an aviation factory and as a photographer on a private beach. From 1942, she was hired as a photojournalist for the local press: Dimanche illustré, la Marseillaise, le Midi Rouge, among others.
His reports bear witness to the precarious living conditions of the inhabitants of the Old Port, the situation of the Jewish women and children interned at the Bompard camp and the maquis operations. She joined the Resistance very early, just like her sister Mindla. Liaison officer for the FTP-MOI, she transports leaflets, weapons, and makes false papers. On 21 August 1944, she took part in the Marseille uprising and documented with her photographs the different moments of the day.
Julia Pirotte returns to Poland, a country in full reconstruction. In 1946, she was one of the only photographers present in Kielce just after the pogrom, her report is a poignant testimony on the still virulent anti-Semitism in her country. In the following months, she accompanied the repatriation convoys of Polish minors from France. In 1948, she covered the World Congress of Intellectuals for Peace in Wroclaw, attended by Pablo Picasso, Irène Joliot-Curie and Aimé Césaire, whose portraits she took were imbued with humanism. At the same time, she was co-founder and director of the Agence de photographie militaire (WAF, 1946-1948).
In 1957, Julia Pirotte went to Israel to experience the collectivist life of the kibbutzim. Back in Poland, she continues to report for the Polish press, but her activity is significantly reduced. From the 1980s, his work as a photographer began to be recognized and his photographs are exhibited in many cities: New York, Arles, Stockholm, Charleroi, Paris, Warsaw, Bratislava among others. On 15 February 1996, France awarded her the title of Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres. She died on 25 July 2000 in Warsaw.
Suzanne Spaak
Mindla Diament
Sister of Julia, a refugee in pre-war France, in 1941 she joined the resistance within the FTP-MOI where she became one of the liaison officers. Arrested in Chalon-sur-Saône, she was deported to Germany on 3 December 1942 and guillotined on 24 August 1944.
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