Gestapo

Date:  1942

Medium: Linocut

Dimensions (cm.): 33.8 x 45.7

Alternate titles: Los verdugos nazis; Los verdugos; La Gestapo, asesinos en comandita; Tortura

Published edition: Unknown

Contemporary publication: El libro negro del terror nazi en Europa, p. 75.

References: Exposición de Homenaje 447, Méndez INBA 20; Prignitz 1378

Commentary:  Méndez created Gestapo for the article “La Gestapo, Asesinos en Comandita” (“The Gestapo, Murderers in Petty Command”), by Rudolf Fuerth, in El libro negro del terror nazi en Europa.  The image portrays three members of the Gestapo torturing two naked men. Méndez captured the “banality of evil,” discussed by Hannah Arendt in her coverage of the trial of Adolf Eichmann, as seen in the casual stance of the German on the left, whose rolled-up sleeves and expression of indifference imply the routine nature of his work, and reveal his emotional detachment from the scene. (Deborah Caplow)

Catalogue record number: 399