Ranging from large-scale portraits to small sketches, Stéphane Mandelbaum’s drawings of historic figures, friends, and anonymous characters who populated Brussels’s subcultures are consummate in technique and deeply disturbing in subject matter. A native of Brussels, Mandelbaum made art for ten years, but in that time he created hundreds of drawings.

A grandson of survivors, Mandelbaum made a conscious choice to grapple with the weight of the Shoah by aggressively appropriating images of Nazis, boldly drawing them over life-size and placing them in juxtaposition with snippets of pornography, derisive caricatures, doodles, and random lists. The representation of images that most people would prefer to avoid was an act of identity-building for a young, rebellious artist hoping to shock. But it was also an act of ownership of a history that Mandelbaum refused to allow to be buried.

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