Peter Weiss

In this preliminary study for Study IV “Liberation” a man hauls his alter ego through various spaces. The scene is reminiscent of Luis Buñuel’s “An Andalusian Dog”, where the man drags along a piano, two priests, and two dead donkeys. Weiss was not happy with this first, more personal version. He gave up the attempt to re-edit it.

A Jewish Holocaust survivor travels through Germany recalling scenes from his memory. This documentary follows a Holocaust survivor in 1965 on an emotional pilgrimage to Bergen Belsen, the last of 11 concentration camps where he was held by the Nazis. He and 30 other former Jewish inmates travel through the new Germany. Scenes still vivid in his mind are recalled in flashback. The memorandum of the title refers to Hitler's memo offering a "final solution" to the "Jewish problem."

The day begins for an avant-garde artist. We see him waking up amid empty bottles, easels, and silk stockings.