Sat Aug 2, 2008 — by Van Jensen

Comics Heal Poland-Israel Relations

Exhibit encourages understanding

There's a neat story in the Jerusalem Post about a comic book exhibit that's aimed at easing the sometimes strained relationship between Israeli and Polish citizens.

Lingering anger from the Holocaust apparently has left something of a schism between the two peoples, and comic books are seen as one way of healing those old wounds.

If you didn't know, 2008-2009 is Israel-Poland year. One of the many events taking place in this framework is the launching of Polisra, the first Israeli-Polish comic book - to be featured at an exhibition at Holon's Israeli Cartoon Museum and at the Tel Aviv comic books festival. The Polish Mickiewicz Institute, which initiated the book, hopes it will be a channel in creating dialogue on topics considered taboo in the two nations' histories. ...

[Publisher Amital] Sandy views Polisra as an opportunity to deal with history and the stereotypes connected to it. One story in the book, for instance, portrays a Polish woman who buys a picture of a Jew counting money for her new house. According to Polish tradition, such a picture brings prosperity to a new home. When no such prosperity arrives, the woman complains of the picture's failure to the salesman. The next frame depicts the salesman in his villa, surrounded by such pictures, exclaiming that, "It works for me!"

"Humor is a great method to examine our values. It takes a situation, flips it upside down, and gives the viewer a whole new perspective on it," Sandy says.

 

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