Self-Portrait of Heinz Geiringer Studying
To Use This Document
With Your Students
Date
1944
Description
Self-portrait of a boy studying at a desk. It was painted by Heinz Geiringer, a Jewish teenager in hiding in Amsterdam during the Holocaust. Geiringer passed his days by painting, writing poetry, learning languages, and playing music. In 1944, the Geiringers were betrayed and captured by the Nazis, leading to Heinz and his father Erich dying at Mauthausen in spring 1945. His mother Elfriede (Fritzi) and his sister Eva survived their imprisonment at Auschwitz-Birkenau. After the war, the women returned to Amsterdam where Fritzi would go on to reconnect with, and eventually marry, their former neighbor Otto Frank (posthumously making Heinz the step brother of Anne Frank), and Eva would retrieve the paintings that Heinz stashed under the floorboards of his hiding place. Today, Eva Schloss-Geiringer continues to educate about the Holocaust and share the artwork of her brother, which stands as a testament to Jewish humanity and cultural resistance in the face of Nazi brutality.
Type
Image
Region
Global
Era
The Great Depression and WW II
Topic
Dutch, Genocide, Global History and Geography, Jewish History, World War II
Repository
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Identifier
55016
Source
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Eva Schloss
Rights
This image is provided for education and research purposes. Rights may be reserved. Responsibility for securing permissions to distribute, publish, reproduce or other use rests with the user. For additional information, see our Copyright and Use Statement.