{"product_id":"charlotte-salomon-life-or-theatre-evelyn-benesch-9783836598651","title":"Charlotte Salomon. Life? or Theatre?","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhen German artist Charlotte Salomon (1917-1943) handed her gouache series Life? or Theater? over to a friend, she beseeched him to \"take good care of it, it is my entire life.\" A few months later, the five-months pregnant Charlotte was picked up by a Gestapo truck, deported to Drancy, and then on to Auschwitz, where she died upon arrival at the age 26.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe work Salomon left behind is, in a very real sense, her pièce de résistance - in her own words, \"something wildly eccentric.\" A cycle of nearly 1,300 autobiographical gouaches, it combines creative force with pioneering personal narrative into one shattering document of self-expression.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDivided into three sections, the gouaches unveil a vivid self-portrait spanning across all facets of Charlotte's existence: from a complicated family life, marked by the suicides of nearly all female relatives; growing up in Berlin; her close relation to singing teacher Alfred Wolfsohn; the rise of the Nazis; to her exile to France in 1939. Throughout, the artist challenges these destructive forces by deploying playful pseudonyms and fantastical elements alongside emotional candor, remarkable observation, and a meticulous visual memory. Her film strip-like sequences are interspersed not only with words but also musical suggestions, making Life? or Theater? the storybook for a whole musical, years before the heyday of that genre.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWithout comparison, the gouaches are a triumph of personal truth and individual expression. Published here with a selection of the most important pieces, Life? Or Theatre? is an unrivaled opus magnum from a great and ambitious artist, dark with her early death, but luminous with her precision, her lyricism, and her courage.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Evelyn Benesch,Judith C. E. Belinfante\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 3836598655\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9783836598651\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Taschen\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 10\/25\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 608\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover","brand":"Evelyn Benesch","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":48874780754175,"sku":"9783836598651","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/charlotte-salomon-life-or-theatre-evelyn-benesch-9783836598651","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}