Lecture by Monica Bohm-Duchen

Prompted by the Warth Mills Project currently underway near Manchester, this illustrated lecture will examine the art produced in Warth Mills and other British internment camps in the broader context of art produced in other internment situations, from the Japanese-American camps in the USA to the Nazi POW and concentration camps. Just what is it that makes human beings feel the urge to create in such adverse and inauspicious circumstances?

Monica Bohm-Duchen is a London-based art historian. Her latest book is Art and the Second World War (Lund Humphries, 2013), and her essay The Two World Wars was published in War and Art: A Visual History of Modern Conflict (Reaktion Books, 2017). She is currently organising a nationwide arts festival, planned for 2019, to pay tribute to the contribution made to British culture by refugees from Nazi-dominated Europe.

This event is part of the Warth Mills Project, a programme of events and activities to tell the story of Britain’s most notorious WWII internment camp: Warth Mills in Bury, Greater Manchester. It is produced by Unity House and supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The lecture is produced by Unity House in association with Manchester Art Gallery and Manchester Jewish Museum.