About the Project
To craft a living artwork that nurtures empathy and instills a dedication to safeguard our common humanity in a world where Jew-hatred rages in major cities around the world.
Vision
Mission
To forge a deep emotional bond with every Jewish life lost during the Holocaust by hand-painting six million rectangles. This connection will transcend cold statistics and help us to understand the number 6,000.000.
My name is Liora Blum, and I am a graphic designer and artist living in Israel. I am the daughter of a Holocaust survivor.
Why Six Million?
I grew up with the number six million. It was always there, a part of my heritage. My grandfather, Jenö Glazer z"l, whom I never got to meet, was one of the millions who perished.
Six million was always an incomprehensible number for me but I needed to see it. As artists, we see the unseen and try to express it as best we can. I thought, if I painted six million brush strokes, what would they look like all packed together? That is how The Six Million Project was born.
My Art of the Holocaust
In my final year of school, I took part in the first March of the Living in Poland. I began my first sketchbook in Auschwitz, and expressed my impressions of the experience in full-color paintings. One of these is now part of the permanent collection at Yad Vashem.
Beginning the Journey
In December 2022, I picked up my paintbrush and began a journey that felt so natural, like the idea had been waiting for its moment. Balancing full-time work with this passion project, I spent my spare moments painting and capturing my progress through photos.
The day before Yom HaShoah, something special happened. I posted an invite on my Facebook group, calling on people to join me in painting. On that meaningful day, five of us gathered around my dining room table, brushes in hand, while we listened to a recording of the testimony of Avraham, my father-in-law, who was in Auschwitz. It was moving; it meant something to each of us.
One woman felt so compelled to be part of this that she drove all the way from the north to join our little group. Two sisters in their early twenties, eager and enthusiastic, showed up. My friend, Tal, lent her brush to the cause, too. It was a quiet yet bonding experience, painting together while sharing those moments of reflection.
I posted about this beautiful experience the following day on Facebook. Unexpectedly, a school friend from Cape Town saw it and asked if she could share it with the local Jewish paper. Suddenly, my project was in the Cape Jewish Chronicle and the South African Jewish Report. That made me believe that this project wasn't just my crazy idea; others might be interested too.
Throughout 2023, I kept painting, usually on weekends and evenings. People, different every time, joined in for a couple of hours here and there. Sometimes friends, sometimes my daughters’ pals. I wrote about it on a local Facebook group, and two wonderful women responded. Since then, they've been regulars, enjoying the calming atmosphere amidst the chaos of sirens during these troubling times of conflict in Israel.
The Art of Liora Blum
I am a freelance graphic designer, specializing in book design.
I spend my free time painting, mostly in gouache and watercolor. I take my sketchbook with me wherever I go and can often be found sketching in nature or painting a street scene with a cup of coffee. I find inspiration everywhere, and I like to translate the beauty I see into color and form – both in painting and digitally.
