Annemie Wolff

JANUARY 8 - MARCH 22, 2018
German-born Dutch photographer Annemie Wolff took formal portraits of Amsterdam's Jews at a time of great danger both for her and for her subjects during the German occupation of The Netherlands. Some of these photos were taken for false papers to aid these individuals in their escape. Other images were taken as mementos for friends, relatives in camps or of remembrances of children when parents went into hiding. These previously lost works, rediscovered in 2008 by Dutch photo historian Simon Kool, help illuminate an untold story of Jewish life in Amsterdam during the Holocaust.

Simon Kool discovered the photo archive of Annemie and Helmuth Wolff in the possession of a family friend, including a box with 100 photo rolls of individual client portraits made from January through October 1943. The archive also contained a receipt book with names and addresses of her clients. Since this discovery, Kool and others at the Annemie and Helmuth Wolff Foundation in Amsterdam have successfully identified and contacted relatives of 325 of the 440 people portrayed in the photographs, and their research continues.

•  PRESS RELEASE

"The importance of Wolff's courageous, illegal portraits of Jews in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam cannot be overstated. After the Holocaust, we are more likely to see dehumanizing images of European Jewry through the eyes of the perpetrators--as starved, lifeless bodies. Wolff's photographs instead connect us to her sitters as spirited, strong, beloved individuals, not as victims, just as Anne Frank's diary reveals resilience and puts a face on the tragedy. A portrait of Hilde Jacobsthal, a close friend of Anne and Margot Frank, is actually in the exhibition. She smiles in her nurse's uniform, refusing to be stigmatized by the required yellow Star of David badge. As only a teenager, Hilde cared for sick and orphaned Jewish children and rescued fellow Jews in that uniform, and thankfully survived, unlike several others captured for the last time by Wolff's camera."

- Dr. Lisa Nicoletti, professor of Art History and Visual Studies at Centenary

This exhibition is supported by the Van Thyn lecture series, which honors Rose and Louis Van Thyn, Holocaust survivors who dedicated themselves to retelling their stories so that people would not forget or repeat those horrors. For her extraordinary community service, Mrs. Van Thyn was awarded the honorary Doctor of Humane Letters at Centenary's 2002 commencement exercises. 

Friends of the Van Thyns established the Rose and Louis Van Thyn Board of Regents Endowed Lectureship in November 2009. The Van Thyn Lectureship provides educational opportunities for the students of the College and members of the surrounding community, with a goal of teaching about the history of the Holocaust, and how to recognize signs of intolerance and provide a means for preventing prejudice and hatred. 

Lost Stories, Found Images: Portraits of Jews in Wartime Amsterdam by Annemie Wolff is a project of, an original exhibit created by, and is on loan from the Wolff Foundation, Amsterdam in partnership with the San Francisco-based Jewish Community Federation.