Auschwitz

I put together a series of photos during my tour at Auschwitz as an expression for how I was feeling when I solemnly walked around the camp. I attempted to place myself there and try to understand how the people must have felt. But it was impossible, even as I walked through, I my mind couldn’t grasp why this happened and with such organization and force.

I shot, one after another of photos, not of the hair from only a mere 100’s of women during only the last weeks before the liberation, nor of the few hundreds of glasses or photographs of the people who came through the camp.

But of the silence.

I coudn't bring myself to shoot the gas chambers where the people thought they were going to take a shower, naked and humiliated. I couldn't press my camera button when I stood in front of the excucution wall just outside the bedrooms of children.

I could only see silence in my photos.

The silence of loss of life.

1.5 million people dead within 5 years time. Walking through Auschiwitz feels like you are walking through a machine of death, with proof of the deceased and there is no feeling of hope. This happened. Human beings did this, not imaginary monsters and not 1000’s of years ago, but just a little over 70 years ago. Not even enough time to live the life expectancy of a human being.