(Zvi Hirsch Schilis, 1909 in Bełchatów — 1987 in Safed)

Hirsch Szylis was a student of the famous Polish painter Maurycy Trębacz. He studied art in Łódź and Warsaw and exhibited his works all over Poland. In December 1939 he was forcibly taken to Łódź Ghetto with his wife, daughter, parents and sister where, on the orders of the head of the German Nazi administration, he had to paint portraits of SS officers. In secret, Szylis painted everyday scenes in the ghetto and hid the pictures. In 1944 he was deported to Auschwitz extermination camp, then to Sachsenhausen, Flossenbürg, and Dachau concentration camps, from where he was ultimately liberated. When he arrived at the DP camp in Feldafing he weighed just 37 kilograms. When he learned of the discovery of some of his works in the former ghetto in Łódź, he turned to the Central Committee of the Liberated Jews and told them of other hiding places. As a result, it was possible for some of his works to be returned to him. erfuhr, wandte er sich an das Zentralkomitee der befreiten Juden und benannte weitere Verstecke, sodass er einzelne seiner Werke zurückerhalten konnte.

He showed 13 pictures with scenes from Łódź Ghetto at the “Exhibition of Jewish Artists.”

Szylis initially emigrated to Paris in 1950 before moving to Israel in 1953 where he lived in the artists’ colony in Safed in the north of Israel.

More about Hirsch Szylis in the Story “Lenbachhaus 1948: Exhibition of Jewish Artists”