Bruno
Schulz, born in 1892, was the child of a Jewish a merchant
in Drohobych, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire
and now part of Ukraine. He grew up to be a teacher,
author and graphic artist in what became Poland after
World War I. His written passages evoked fantastic dreams
which were in turn, reflected in his drawings and paintings.
Schultz worked as a Polish writer and artist, but the
Nazis targeted anyone with Jewish heritage for extermination.
During the last weeks of his life, Schultz painted a
mural in his home in Drohobych, very much in the style
with which he is identified. Soon after completing the
work, the Gestapo murdered him and the mural was covered.
Earlier this year, representatives
of Yad Vashem in Israel came to Drohobych to examine
the mural. In the course of the next three days, they
removed five sections of the mural and transported them
to Jerusalem. They had no authority or export licenses
from Ukraine to do so. In the ensuing debate over the
legality and ethics of the removal of this cultural
treasure, Sam Gruber, a consultant to the U.S. Commission
on Cultural Preservation and an expert on Jewish Cultural
History in Ukraine, appealed to the UMA for background
on the controversy. He subsequently wrote an op-ed piece
for the New York Times criticizing Yad Vashem officials
for operating outside accepted standards for the export
of cultural artifacts and took part in a forum at the
New York Public Library on the issue. Sam was part of
the official Delegation to the U.S.-Ukraine Joint Cultural
Heritage Commission that was held in Kyiv in May 2000
and visited sites where Jews and Ukrainians were massacred
in World War II and during Stalin's Terror.
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