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Sonia Simmenauer-Pazzini and Karl-Josef Pazzini

Interview and Photo from the Frédéric Brenner – ZERHEILT: HEALED TO PIECES Exhibition Opening

A smiling couple, both gray-haired, she all in black, he in a white suit and straw hat stands next to a portrait of them in the exhibition, in the portrait they are standing behind a table looking in different directions

Sonia Simmenauer-Pazzini and Karl-Josef Pazzini in the exhibition ZERHEILT: HEALED TO PIECES; Jewish Museum Berlin, photo: Jule Roehr

My name is Sonia Simmenauer-Pazzini and I’m a woman, a mother and grandmother, a concert agent and salonière, among other things. I followed the development of the ZERHEILT project with Frédéric Brenner very closely and learned a lot from his quest and his lens, for which I am very grateful.

My name is Karl-Josef Pazzini and every now and then, when the analysands cooperate, I’m a psychoanalyst.

Where did the idea for your portrait’s staging and setting come from?

Karl-Josef Pazzini: The idea gradually developed for Frédéric Brenner as he walked through the apartment. Maybe the balcony was the extent of it.

How do you experience Jewish life in Berlin?

Karl-Josef Pazzini: Reading, in conversations, when I walk down the street, sometimes without noticing, probably even unconsciously.

Describe your life in Berlin in three adjectives.

Karl-Josef Pazzini: That’s an overwhelming prospect.

What would your wish be for the future of Jewish life in Berlin?

Karl-Josef Pazzini: I’d like to see more of Yeshayahu Leibowitz’s attitude among all Berliners:

“Y.L.: Of course, but I do believe that the Messiah will come. –

M.S.: And what is the Messiah’s role, in your opinion? –

Y.L.: I don’t know the answer to that, and I also have no way of finding out anything about it. ... The profound meaning of the messianic idea is that the coming of the Messiah will forever be a coming in the future tense. Any Messiah who comes in the present is a false Messiah.”

(Leibowitz & Shashar, 1994, p. 154)

A couple dressed in shades of black, white and gray stand behind a table with striped tea cups, she in half-profile looking to the right, he frontally but not looking directly at the camera

From the photographic essay ZERHEILT: HEALED TO PIECES by Frédéric Brenner; Jewish Museum Berlin, purchased with the support of the Friends of the Jewish Museum Berlin

Citation recommendation:

Jewish Museum Berlin (2021), Sonia Simmenauer-Pazzini and Karl-Josef Pazzini. Interview and Photo from the Frédéric Brenner – ZERHEILT: HEALED TO PIECES Exhibition Opening.
URL: www.jmberlin.de/en/node/8405

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