Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art, Inc.

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Fritz Ascher Society for Persecuted, Ostracized and Banned Art, Inc.

Discussing and exhibiting artists who were marginalized and persecuted by an authoritarian regime

06/15/2026

🌟 Starting TODAY: Your impact can go twice as far! 🌟 From now until June 20, every donation to the Fritz Ascher Society will be MATCHED dollar for dollar by a generous supporter. This is a unique opportunity to support us in expanding our reach and in discovering and researching buried art treasures and their stories. Donate now and double your support: https://fritzaschersociety.org/donate/ The Fritz Ascher Society is a not-for-profit 501(c)3 organization. Your donation is fully tax deductible.

06/12/2026

Step into the vibrant world of Fritz Ascher this weekend with his expressive watercolor, "Three Trees" (ca. 1960). Feel the energy of spring in Berlin as bold colors and dynamic brushstrokes capture the resilience and beauty of nature. Discover how art can speak across time and inspire us today.

Which detail draws you in the most? Share your thoughts below!

06/11/2026

"He had taught himself to read at age 4, was a communist at age 14, at 18 he was arrested and sentenced to death, he eloped with my mother to Bolivia. He said he had helped protect the world from Armageddon. When he died I received a box of his papers."
Watch Tom Weidlinger's documentary about his father Paul Weidlinger in our free online screening (6/17-25) and join the conversation with the filmmaker (6/24) - registration: https://fritzaschersociety.org/exhibition-event/the-restless-hungarian/.

06/10/2026

A motherless child and captain of industry, a clandestine communist who came to design silos for the world’s deadliest weapons, a refugee from the Holocaust who denied that he was a Jew, the husband who was terrified of his wife’s mental illness, and a man whose personal saints were artists, elevated above all others - filmmaker Tom Weidlinger traces his father, pioneering structural engineer Paul Weidlinger's story.
Watch his documentary in our free online screening (6/17-25) and join the conversation with Tom Weidlinger (6/24) - registration: https://fritzaschersociety.org/exhibition-event/the-restless-hungarian/.

06/09/2026

Step into history through the eyes of Fritz Ascher (1893–1970). On his walks to the Grunewald city forest, Ascher passed the iconic Jagdschloss Grunewald—the oldest preserved palace in Berlin, built in 1542 as a Renaissance hunting lodge. His 1963 gouache captures the spirit of this remarkable place, blending memory, resilience, and artistic vision. Fritz Ascher, Jagdschloss Grunewald, ca. 1963.

06/08/2026

Happy Monday with Fritz Ascher, Sunflower from ca. 1958. White gouache over black ink and watercolour on paper, 24.5 x 17.8 in.!

06/05/2026

Last weekend! Ceija Stojka: Making Visible is on view until June 7 at The Drawing Center in New York City: https://drawingcenter.org/exhibitions/ceija-stojka

Ceija Stojka: Making Visible features the work of Roma artist, activist, writer, lyricist, and singer Ceija Stojka (1933-2013). Comprising more than sixty artworks, as well as a selection of sketchbooks, archival material, and documentary films made during Stojka’s lifetime, Making Visible explores the fullness of Stojka’s production as a visual artist, centered in her Roma life and heritage. Spurred by the resurgence of extreme right nationalism in Austria and abroad, and by her experiences as a Holocaust survivor, Stojka created works of profound beauty and horror that resonate today in strikingly contemporary terms.

06/04/2026

Paul Klee, Angelus Novus, 1920. The Israel Museum, Jerusalem.
In 1921 the German philosopher Walter Benjamin purchased Angelus Novus, which he famously described in his Theses on the Philosophy of History as the "Angel of History," a profound symbol of the catastrophes of the past, rather than progress. He interpreted the angel's expression as a desire to stay and repair, but forced forward by a "storm" that Benjamin identified as progress.
Fleeing N**i persecution, Benjamin entrusted the drawing to his friend Gershom Scholem by way of the philosopher Georges Bataille and Benjamin's fellow scholar Theodor Adorno. Scholem hung the work in his apartment in Jerusalem.
Seen in the exhibition Paul Klee: Other Possible Worlds at The Jewish Museum New York: https://thejewishmuseum.org/exhibitions/paul-klee-other-possible-worlds/.

06/02/2026

Paul Klee, Mask of Fear (Maske Furcht), 1932, 286. Oil on burlap. Museum of Modern Art, New York, Nelson A. Rockefeller Fund
The blunt terror of this work is explicit in contrast to the underlying apprehension of Arab Song (on view nearby). Klee was inspired to create Mask of Fear by a Zuni war god carving he had seen in an ethnographic museum. Its imagery resonates with the artist's conception, expressed in his diary, of the "mask as work of art; behind it hides the man." Within months of painting Mask of Fear, both Klee and his art had been called "degenerate," and his paintings were removed from all the museums in Germany.
Seen in the exhibition Paul Klee: Other Possible Worlds at The Jewish Museum New York: https://thejewishmuseum.org/exhibitions/paul-klee-other-possible-worlds/.

06/01/2026

Do you want to read the book before you watch the documentary film? The Restless Hungarian: Modernism, Madness and the American Dream was published in April 2019 by Spark Press. The book won a Gold Medal for Biography from the Independent Book Publishers Association.
"In excavating the mysterious background of his titanic father, Weidlinger deploys the kind of compressed storytelling he has honed as a documentary filmmaker: deftly intercutting between past and present, revealing tantalizing clues that he follows across continents and epochs, and providing lively context that enriches his family’s saga. It’s a deeply affecting journey." (Peter L. Stein, executive director emeritus of the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival)

Registration link for both the free online screening (6/17-25) and the discussion with film director Tom Weidlinger (6/24): https://fritzaschersociety.org/exhibition-event/the-restless-hungarian/.

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New York, NY

Telephone

+19173630056

Website

https://fritzaschersociety.org/

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