I currently work on the strategic vision and knowledge development for a permanent building for the Swedish Holocaust Museum. She holds a PhD in Aesthetics from Södertörn University, Sweden.
Rebecka Katz Thor
Associate Professor
My research interests include cultural memory studies, processes of commemoration in monuments and museums, and political, historical, and ethical claims in cultural heritage and contemporary art.
About
I am writer and associate professor at REMESO, Linköping University.
Publications
Al my publications
Books
Beyond the Witness – Holocaust Representation and the Testimony of Images, dissertation
Art and Theory Publishing 2018. ISBN 978-91-88031-61-7 (PDF)
Academic article
Concepts for Contemporary Monuments
Vol. XVI:4. Baltic Worlds 2023. Pp 54-58. (PDF)
Postmonuments? A Discontinued Project, A Current and A Prospective Monument In Sweden
Politeja No. 3(84), 2023. pp. 5- 18. (PDF)
Att se bortom seendets gränser, Bildkonflikter
Kultur & Klasse, Årg. 50 Nr. 133, eds. Rebecka Katz Thor, Karen Magrehte Simonsen & Cecilia Sjöholm, 2022. Pp. 63-77. (PDF)
An Eternal Witness, Thresholds 50: Before // After, Eds: Jola Idowu, Ardalan Sadeghi Kivi, Meriam Soltan and Antonio Pacheco
Boston: MIT Press, pp. 103-105 (PDF)
”Minne och monument - förhandlingar om sårbarhet och sörjbarhet i det offentliga rummet”
Tidskriften Glänta, 2021. Pp. 5-15. (PDF)
Vol. XVI:4. Baltic Worlds 2023. Pp 54-58. (PDF)
Postmonuments? A Discontinued Project, A Current and A Prospective Monument In Sweden
Politeja No. 3(84), 2023. pp. 5- 18. (PDF)
Att se bortom seendets gränser, Bildkonflikter
Kultur & Klasse, Årg. 50 Nr. 133, eds. Rebecka Katz Thor, Karen Magrehte Simonsen & Cecilia Sjöholm, 2022. Pp. 63-77. (PDF)
An Eternal Witness, Thresholds 50: Before // After, Eds: Jola Idowu, Ardalan Sadeghi Kivi, Meriam Soltan and Antonio Pacheco
Boston: MIT Press, pp. 103-105 (PDF)
”Minne och monument - förhandlingar om sårbarhet och sörjbarhet i det offentliga rummet”
Tidskriften Glänta, 2021. Pp. 5-15. (PDF)
Book chapters
Att minnas och representera förintelsen, Lärobok om Förintelsen i Sverige
Natur & Kultur, forthcoming January 2024.
Monumental Tiredness – The time and function of monuments
Public Art, Public Memory, Stockholm: Art & Theory, eds. Annika Enqvist, Rebecka Katz Thor, Karolina Modig & Joanna Zawieja, September 2022. Pp. 19-27. (PDF)
Vulnerable Memories—Monuments and Grievability
Thinking through Göteborg International Biennial for Contemporary Art, ed. Lisa Rosendahl, Milan: Mousse Publishing 2022. Pp. 166-183
”Mich wird es geben”, Was denkt das Denkmal?
Eine Anthologie zur Denkmalkultur, ed. Tanja Schult & Julia Lange, Köln: Böhlau Verlag 2021. pp. 17-26. (PDF)
En blick bortom seendets gränser, Blick, rörelse, röst: Festskrift till Cecilia Sjöholm
eds. Rebecka Katz Thor & Erik Wallrup, Stockholm: Södertrön University Press 2020, pp. 51-55.
Ihågkom oss till liv, Att hopfoga den sönderfallande världen: LENKE ROTHMAN, Alina Chaiderov, Gery Georgieva, ed. Joanna Nordin
Nyköping: Sörmlandsmuseum 2019, pp. 44-53. (PDF)
The Limits of the Reconcilable: Arendt, Eichmann, and Heidegger
On Reconciliation / Über Versöhnung, ed. Dora Garcia, Berlin: K-Verlag 2018. ISBN 978-3-9818635-2-9, pp. 49-59 (PDF)
Essays and popular culture
Därför måste Förintelsemuseet ha en rörlig syn på historien och minnet
Dagens Nyheter (24/1 2022)
Arkivet som konstverk (Lenke Rothman & Runo Lagomarsino)
Tydningen nr. 37/38: ARKIV 2, 2021
Att låta statyer stå är att döma vissa liv som inte sörjbara
essä, Dagens Nyheter (30/6 2020)
Kafkas manuskript hör hemma i en permanent diaspora
Dagens Nyheter (22/7 2019)
Därför kan en bild av Förintelsen säga både mer och mindre än tusen röster
essä, Dagens Nyheter (25/1 2019)
Ett Arkiv för framtiden
en rapport för Statens Konstråd, 2018.
Transformation of Past and Present
Carla Zaccagnini and Runo Lagomarsino, ed. Diana Baldon, Milano: Mousse Publishing 2015. ISBN 9788867491667, pp. 81-83.
Återupprepa, Repetition, Repetera, Glas är massa i rörelse
Kalmar Konstmuseum ISBN 9789198283419.
Bild och Åminnelse, Auschwitz och kulturen
Aiolos #52-53, 2015.
Vad gör en bild? Om mediets betydelse: Laokoon och montage hos Lessing och Eisenstein
Paletten # 296, 2014
Judith Butlers judiska etik
Paletten #290, 2013
Åter till diasporan – en längtan bortom Israel
Paletten #289, 2012
Are the others called Jews here? MD Marguerite Duras
Judiska teatern, ISBN: 9789197716314, 2009.
Reviews and other texts
- Underkänd avhandling går till historien, Expressen (19/7 2020)
- Kafkas manuskript hör hemma i en permanent diaspora, Dagens Nyheter (22/7 2019)
- Ett Arkiv för framtiden, en rapport för Statens Konstråd, 2018.
- 3D Hologrammet, Paletten #310, 2018
- Vad är en konstnär, Tidningen Konstnären, 2018.
- Mot en värdig bild av kriget, Kunstkritikk, 2017
- Geografisk och social dissonans på Documenta, Kunstkritikk, 2017
- En fråga om redistribution, Kunstkritikk, 2017
- En historia för framtiden, Tidskriften Cora, 2015
- I en nyss lämnad dåtid, Kunstkritikk, 2015
- Interview Maria Lind, Kunstkritikk, 2015
- Interview Nisrine Boukhari, Kunstkritikk, 2015
- Svensk närvaro i Vendig, Kunstkritikk, 2015
- I bought Europe, Kunstkritikk, 2013
- I en kvinnovärld Kunstkritikk, 2013
- Impulse Slight Nina Canell, Statens Konstråd, 2013
- Julkalender, Kunstkritikk, 2013.
- Utställningen utan minne, Kunstkritikk, 2013.
- Fragmenterad tid, Kunstkritikk, 2012
- Återvinning eller bokbål? Kunstkritikk, 2012
- Backwards/Towards a Non-European Europe, CCA London-Derry, 2012.
- Out of the Common: Write Marginal/Right Marginal, Turku Biennal, 2011.
- Politik enligt konstens alla regler (Politics According to the Arts Rule), Kunstkritikk, 2011
- Representing the Eichmann Trial, 50 years of controversy and the politics of visualization in the The Specialist, Movimento!, 2011
- Man Made Worlds, or, For Europe: a South American A, B and C, Rotor Poster Project, 2010
- Representing the Eichmann Trial: 10 years of controversy around The Specialist. MA thesis, 2009
- Bye, Bye Birdie, In: Mornings in Mexico, Guangzhou Biennal, 2008
- Are the others called Jews here? Text in: MD (Marguerite Duras). SE
- Representing the Eichmann Trial: 10 years of controversy around The Specialist. MA thesis, 2009.
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Quarterly discussions, Catalogue text, Umeå Fine Arts Academy, 2007.
Research
Organisation
Co-workers
Research projects
Remember us To Life
Vulnerable Memories in a Prospective Monument, Memorial and Museum
(Riksbankens Jubileumsfond 2021-2025).
The project follows three ongoing commemorative projects in Sweden: A Holocaust museum in Stockholm, a monument illuminating Sweden’s colonial history (currently discontinued) in Gothenburg, and an anti-racist monument in Malmö. The research follows the development of the examples and addresses how contemporary discussions of public commemoration can be understood in relation to notions of repair, vulnerability and grievability, as well as the role of the commissioner. The aim is to consider how future practices of commemoration can be sensible to a variety of aesthetic expressions, voices and experiences and how these commemorative projects can be considered as a form of ethical response to the past.
Läs mer om projektet på Riksbankens Jubileumsfonds webbplats: Ihågkom oss till liv - Sårbara minnen i ett blivande monument, minnesmärke och museum
Distrusting Monuments
Distrusting Monuments
Art and the War in Former Yugoslavia
(The Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies 2022-2025)
This project researches the development of a new kind of memory culture that has emerged in former Yugoslavia. The process of historicizing the wars in former Yugoslavia (1991-2001), as well as the Second World War, is still ongoing in the region and carries multiple perspectives, on a scale between nationalist ideology and transnationalist ideas of solidarity. Memory culture has come to involve a wide array of agents, materials and forms of expressions, rather than just state funded memorials and museums. The research also concerns a more general view of artistic interventions in the writing of history as a tendency on the transnational scene of contemporary art.
Offentligt minne - konst
Offentligt minne, offentlig konst
Reflektioner om monument och minneskonst i samtiden
Redigerad av Annika Enqvist, Karolina Modig, Rebecka Katz Thor och Joanna Zawieja.
Vad är det att minnas genom konst? Denna antologi innehåller 25 texter som syftar till att fördjupa och nyansera frågor om monument och minneskonst, och de diskussioner och tankar som gestaltas i våra gemensamma rum. I detta fält fyllt av spänningar och korskopplingar reflekterar skribenterna kring monumentalitet, förutsättningar för representationer av minne, görandet av demokrati och spår av makt och förtryck. Några av texterna utgår från specifika verk, andra söker formulera en mer övergripande kritik av offentlighetens ramar i relation till offentlig konst och minne. Minnesarbetet i de verk som diskuteras är av olika slag; det sträcker sig från uttalade monument och minnesmärken till verk kopplade till demokratifrågor. Texterna uppmärksammar vad det innebär att ta plats och bli synlig, och genom det skrivas in i en offentlig historia.
Offentligt minne, offentlig konst : Reflektioner om monument och minneskonst i samtiden finns hos Statens konstråd.
Offentligt minne - monument
Public Memory – Monuments and Difficult Heritages
(Symposium November 14-15th 2023)
Monuments have provoked discussions and actions during the past decade. Some have been toppled, others questioned. Throughout the world, production is underway of new memorials that commemorate difficult heritages and previously unaddressed issues in public history. At the symposium questions of how a society can remember and take responsibility for difficult pasts and its legacies was discussed. Along with issues concerning what the role of public art and monuments is in such context, and what roles the commissioners, artists and the public audience play. The symposium was organised by Rebecka Katz Thor and Annika Enqvist, Public Art Agency Sweden.
Läs mer om projektet hos Statens konstråd.
Lenke Rothman
Lenke Rothman
Life as Cloth [working title] (2024)
Life as Cloth presents a wide array of works by Lenke Rothman at Malmö Konsthall in the fall 2024. Rothman was a Swedish/Hungarian artist, writer, and Holocaust survivor, based in Sweden from 1945 until her death in 2008. Rothman's extensive production contained paintings, drawings, installations, books, sculptures, sewn objects and textiles. Constantly curious, Rothman experimented in a range of materials, exploring the inherent narrative potential of these materials. With an insistence on the materials' own possibilities of speaking, of expressing, and of remembering she created an oeuvre that is polyphonic and at the same time extremely personal. She worked with fragments, discarded materials and the force of narration, where time, objects, stitches and memories make up the fabric of life.
In her artistic practice she returns to her personal experience of the Holocaust. In her visual art and writing, she formulates an answer to the question that occupies her; “how life should be saved and preserved from the constantly ongoing destruction” (Rothman 1980). An exhibition of Rothman’s work gives way to the question of art as a form of ethically necessary response, not only as means of expression for the individual artist but for a society to mourn, to live on and aim for a better future.
In her artistic practice she returns to her personal experience of the Holocaust. In her visual art and writing, she formulates an answer to the question that occupies her; “how life should be saved and preserved from the constantly ongoing destruction” (Rothman 1980). An exhibition of Rothman’s work gives way to the question of art as a form of ethically necessary response, not only as means of expression for the individual artist but for a society to mourn, to live on and aim for a better future.
A new generation of scholars of antisemitism
A new generation of scholars of antisemitism
Novel approaches to gender, sexuality and Jewish identity in a post-secular conjuncture. (Research network, Swedish Research Council, 2023-2025)
Bringing together a new generation of scholars of antisemitism, this project aims to stimulate cross-fertilization between research on antisemitism and studies of gender, religion and secularity. Across two years, a cross-disciplinary core group of five researchers from history, gender studies and aesthetics will bring together a broad international network of 14 prominent scholars in the research area, to gather and disseminate knowledge on the topic through the organization of joint workshops, international conferences, a master class, and co-written publications.
Beyond the Witness
Beyond the Witness
Holocaust Representation and the Testimony of Images (Doktorsavhandling, monografi)
I tre arkivbaserade filmer av Harun Farocki, Yael Hersonski och Eyal Sivan reaktiveras och omtolkas rörliga bilder från Förintelsen. I en tid då de sista vittnena snart kommer att vara borta inställer sig frågan om vad för slags vittnesmål bilder kan ge för att bevara minnet. I den här avhandlingen undersöks rörliga bilder som komplexa enheter som producerats, reproducerats och resituerats i skilda politiska och historiska situationer.
Råmaterial som producerats som nazistisk propaganda respektive videoinspelningen av en politiskt laddad rättegång i Förintelsens efterspel får en ny mening. Materialens arkivstatus, kontext och produktionsvillkor, liksom deras representation, ger ett ramverk för en analys genom vilken bilders vittnesmål kan förstås.
Hos Art & Theory finns mer information.
Beyond the Witness: Holocaust Representations and the Testimony of Images finns även i DIVA.
And all is yet to be done
And All is Yet to Be Done (2015-)
And All is Yet to Be Done is a long-term collaboration with artist Petra Bauer, exploring how spatial and temporal structures are activated within feminist practice. The project traced similarities between contemporary associations and the early radical feminist movements (1900-1923). The interest in history is not a question of historicising, rather it is a quest of what in the historical that might help us create an alternative future. Hence, we highlight forms of resistance, which often are overlooked that continually challenge and re-shape communities. By acknowledging elements that usually remain invisible, such as the role of meetings, cooking and handicraft, one might offer a counter narrative. The project amounted to several works and iterations and was first exhibited at Gothenburg International Biennale of Contemporary Art in 2015 and And All is Yet to be Done: The Grammar of Feminist Organising (2018) was commissioned by Riga International Biennale of Contemporary Art and took place in Kanepes Kulturas centrs, in Riga. In 2018 the project was invited for an exhibition at Extra City Kunsthalle in Antwerp, due to institutional conflicts we decided to only be present with a statement.The last part of the project, too this day, was presented in the publication Red Love: A Reader on Alexandra Kollontai published by Sternberg Press 2020.