Astrid Schmetterling’s research focuses on the relation between history, culture and memory, between the act of bearing witness and the act of making art. In this context, she is interested in contemporary international arts practices (see her co-authored book with Lynn Turner on Visual Cultures as Recollection and her articles on Arnold Dreyblatt, Vivienne Koorland, Ulrike Grossarth and Uriel Orlow) as well as in early 20th century German culture (see her work on Charlotte Salomon and Else Lasker-Schüler). Schmetterling’s writing is informed by the insights of diaspora, postcolonial and transcultural memory studies.

Astrid Schmetterling’s current project interweaves biography, history and memory theory. It traces the histories of two families, that of her own Jewish family and that of the Polish family that hid them during the Holocaust in an empty pigeon loft in the Eastern Galician town of Kopyczyńce (then Poland, now Ukraine). Different temporalities – the act of hiding during the Holocaust, the postwar period, losing and finding one another after the fall of communism, the unusual bond between the families in the present – will be linked chronologically, but also associatively with the experience of travel in the Ukraine now. The historical, the imagined and the actual contemporary Galicia will thus productively disrupt each other. Beyond the act of rescue, Astrid Schmetterling is interested in the divergent experiences of the two families under the different occupiers of multiethnic Galicia. This will involve an engagement with incompatible experiences and memories of the Jewish, Polish and Ukranian populations informed by recent thinking on transcultural and multidirectional memory (Astrid Erll and Michael Rothberg). In addition, reflections on questions of memory and postmemory (Marianne Hirsch) and Astrid Schmetterling’s role as mediator of this history will critically interrogate the narrative and shape the form of the project.

Book

Charlotte Salomon. Bilder eines Lebens
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2017. Charlotte Salomon. Bilder eines Lebens. Berlin: Jüdischer Verlag im Suhrkamp Verlag. ISBN 978-3-633-54283-3

Visual Cultures As Recollection
Schmetterling, Astrid and Turner, Lynn. 2013. Visual Cultures As Recollection. Berlin: Sternberg Press. ISBN 978-3-943365-40-5

Book Section

‘Uriel Orlow’s “Unmade Film”: A Multidirectional Archive for Palestinian and Israeli Traumatic Memory’
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2017. ‘Uriel Orlow’s “Unmade Film”: A Multidirectional Archive for Palestinian and Israeli Traumatic Memory’. In: Maria Magdalena Schwaegermann and Karmenlara Ely, eds. Infinite Record: Archive, Memory, Performance. New York: Brooklyn Arts Press, pp. 136-143. ISBN 978-1-936767-41-0

'Szepty Bławatne / Das Flüstern der Stoffe / The Whispering of Fabric. Ulrike Grossarth'
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2011. 'Szepty Bławatne / Das Flüstern der Stoffe / The Whispering of Fabric. Ulrike Grossarth'. In: , ed. Stoffe aus Lublin. Leipzig: Spector Books, pp. 77-92. ISBN 978-3-940064-16-5

"Das ist direkt ein Diebstahl an den Kunsthistorikern". Else Lasker-Schülers bildnerisches Werk im kunsthistorischen Kontext
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2010. "Das ist direkt ein Diebstahl an den Kunsthistorikern". Else Lasker-Schülers bildnerisches Werk im kunsthistorischen Kontext. In: Ricarda Dick, ed. Else Lasker-Schüler. Die Bilder. Berlin: Jüdischer Verlag im Suhrkamp Verlag, pp. 159-193. ISBN 9783633542468

Inscriptions of Difference in Charlotte Salomon's Work
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2006. Inscriptions of Difference in Charlotte Salomon's Work. In: Michael Steinberg and Monica Bohm-Duchen, eds. Reading Charlotte Salomon. New York: Cornell University Press, pp. 140-147. ISBN 9780801439711

‘Charlotte Salomons “Leben? Oder Theater?“ Ein Werk jenseits der Assimilation’
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2004. ‘Charlotte Salomons “Leben? Oder Theater?“ Ein Werk jenseits der Assimilation’. In: E. Müller and Andrea Schatz, eds. Der Differenz auf der Spur. Frauen und Gender in Aschkenas. Berlin: Metropol Verlag, pp. 286-303. ISBN 978-3936411478

'Nachwort'
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2001. 'Nachwort'. In: , ed. Helga Weissová, Zeichne, was Du siehst. Zeichnungen eines Kindes aus Theresienstadt. Frankfurt am Main: Insel, pp. 94-111. ISBN 3-458-34456-X

Article

‘Biographien jüdischer Frauen: Zur Aktualität Charlotte Salomons’
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2015. ‘Biographien jüdischer Frauen: Zur Aktualität Charlotte Salomons’. Medaon – Magazin für jüdisches Leben in Forschung und Bildung, 9(17), pp. 1-5.

‘K. Hannah Holtschneider, The Holocaust and Representations of Jews: History and Identity in the Museum’ (Book Review)
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2013. ‘K. Hannah Holtschneider, The Holocaust and Representations of Jews: History and Identity in the Museum’ (Book Review). Journal of Jewish Studies, 64(2), pp. 427-430. ISSN 0022-2097

“I am Jussuf of Egypt”: Else Lasker-Schüler’s Orientalist Drawings
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2012. “I am Jussuf of Egypt”: Else Lasker-Schüler’s Orientalist Drawings. Ars Judaica, 8, pp. 81-98.

Vivienne Koorland: Reisemalheurs (Travel Woes)
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2008. Vivienne Koorland: Reisemalheurs (Travel Woes). Textile The Journal of Cloth and Culture, 6(1), pp. 88-97. ISSN 14759756

Archival Obsessions: Arnold Dreyblatt's Memory Work
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2007. Archival Obsessions: Arnold Dreyblatt's Memory Work. Art Journal, 66(4), pp. 70-83. ISSN 0004-3249

Encounters at the Site of Trauma
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2006. Encounters at the Site of Trauma. Third Text, 20(5), pp. 561-570. ISSN 09528822

Irene Below: Hidden Treasures. Irma Stern. Her Books, Painted Book Covers and Bookplates
Schmetterling, Astrid. 2002. Irene Below: Hidden Treasures. Irma Stern. Her Books, Painted Book Covers and Bookplates. Frauen Kunst Wissenschaft(34), pp. 88-92. ISSN 0935-6967

Tracing the Life (or Theatre?) of Charlotte Salomon
Schmetterling, Astrid. 1997. Tracing the Life (or Theatre?) of Charlotte Salomon. Issues in Architecture Art & Design, 5(1), pp. 115-128. ISSN 0960-8648