The Center for European Studies in collaboration with The Bildner Center for the Study of Jewish Life sponsored a public discussion  on Radical Aesthetics and the Holocaust on the occasion of a new evaluation of Alain Resnais'  Nuit et Brouillard (Night and Fog).

RADICAL AESTHETICS  AND THE HOLOCAUST

On Alain Resnais' Nuit et Brouillard (Night and Fog)

Participants

Nitzan Lebovic (Tel-Aviv University); Fatima Naqvi (Rutgers University;  Jeffrey Shandler (Rutgers University); Ewout van der Knaap (University of Utrecht); Alan Williams (Rutgers University)

The first film to show images from the death camps publicly, Alain Resnais' Night and Fog (1955) plays a central role in shaping the collective memory of the 1940-45 genocide. As such, this classic documentary and its lessons also transformed the public debate over film making and its social role. Following the recent publication of Uncovering the Holocaust. The International Reception of Night and Fog (Ewout van der Knaap, ed., Wallflower Press, UK), this panel will discuss the stormy debate that the film provoked in France, Germany, Britain and Israel, and the questions it raised, and still raises, about the relation between national history and radical aesthetics.



Note: This was the first program where the Center made use of its new audio-visual equipment and conference room.  The September 27 event was preceded by two screenings of Night and Fog (with subtitles in English) in the new room.

The evening included a dinner buffet for all attendants.