Gouache painting of a prisoner at the Majdanek concentration camp

Eugeniusz Baranowski was boen in 1916 in Poland. In 1937, he graduated from the Department of Decorative Arts & Artistic Industry at the State Technical School of Lvov. In September1939, when Germany invaded Poland, he fought with the Polish Army. He was later arrested by the Germans along with his wife, Stefania and his brother, Tadeusz. After being held in several prisons, he was sent to Majdanek concentration camp in 1943. Another brother and his father were already imprisoned at Majdanek and the father and Tadeusz eventually perished in the camps. The war ended when Germany surrendered in May 1945. Eugeniusz survived the camps, but his spine was permanently damaged from injuries he suffered as a prisoner. From 1946 to 1950, he taught sculpture at an art school in Zamosc. From 1950 to 1956, he served as an instructor at a state art high school in Lublin. In 1956, he received a graduate degree in sculpture from the Academy of Art in Warsaw. He agreed to only two exhibitions of his work during his lifetime. Eugeniusz, 72, died in 1988.

The painting was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1998 by Irena Hochman.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Irena Hochman