UTW 30

Rachel Cyrkin of Paris, France

Art: 1996
Media: Ink on paper / encre de Chine sur papier
Framed, 31 inches H x 39 W
Taille, encadrée: 31 pouces hauteur x largeur 39 [78.7 cm. H x 99 W]

Drawn from a photo loaned by (now deceased) French ‘Hidden Child’ survivor Gisele Feldman, an American immigrant and retired French public school teacher, Michigan.
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Ms. Feldman (1930- 2017) was the author of this acclaimed book:
Saved by the spirit of Lafayette : the French Righteous and the Hidden Children (Publishd by Ferne Press, Northville, Michigan, 2008)
Language: English; 150 p. : ill. ; 20 cm., ISBN: 9781933916217;
ISBN 1933916214 (pbk.) 

A small reproduction of the drawing of Rachel Cyrkin is seen in the book Tradition and Transformation: Three Millennia of Jewish Art & Architecture,
Ori Z. Soltes, pub by Canal Street Studios, NY, 2016; plate 528, page 457.
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Mme. Cyrkin, her husband, and their two children (the children were first cousins of Ms. Feldman; Mr. and Mrs. Cyrkin was an aunt and uncle of Ms. Feldman) were deported to Auschwitz where they were murdered.
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Rachel Cyrkin was born July 22 or Aug 4, 1908. She was arrested on July 16, 1942 and interned (imprisoned) on July 20th in the French prison camp Baune la Rolande. From there she was deported to the Auschwitz death camp complex where she was murdered.
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Rachel's husband Maurice was arrested on Feb. 4, 1944, interned (imprisoned) in the French internment camp at Drancy, and deported to Auschwitz on Feb. 10, 1944 where he was murdered.
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Their daughter Odette was born in Paris in 1931. She was arrested on July 16, 1942. She was interned (imprisoned) at Beaune La Rolande on July 20th, then transferred to the French internment (prison) camp at Drancy on Aug. 19th. She was deported to the Auschwitz death camp complex that left Drancy on Aug. 21; she was murdered at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The convoy was almost entirely children.

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Their son Marcel (Odette's brother; and a first cousin of Ms. Feldman) was born in 1928 in Paris. He was arrested on July 16, 1942; interned (imprisoned) at Beaune La Rolande on July 20th. He was in a convoy from there to the Auschwitz death camp complex on Aug. 7, 1942, where he was murdered.
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Segan met Ms. Feldman in the 1990’s when she lived in the same building as Segan’s mother.

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A 3 min., 3 sec. video of the drawing

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Transcript of a biographical history of the Feldman family, from an oral history- video interview with Ms. Feldman, August 2002.