I really should have written these a long time ago. Hopefully it’s better late than never! Is your book club reading CHASING PORTRAITS? The following questions are intended to help prompt a lively book club discussion. You may, of course, adapt and revise them to best fit your group! For information about connecting Elizabeth to your book club, please email elizabeth@ChasingPortraits.org
WHAT DID YOU know about Holocaust era art restitution issues before reading this book? What surprised you the most about these issues as portrayed in Chasing Portraits?
HOW WAS THE Rynecki family wartime experience the same or different than other World War II accounts that you’ve read?
DO YOU HAVE a favorite Rynecki painting? Is there one described in the book that you wish you could see in person?
A PIVOTAL MOMENT for the author is the discovery of a message her Grandpa George left her in his memoir (page 18). The author talks about the staggering burden of history and legacy upon her shoulders. How did that make you feel? Has someone ever left you a message that inspired you to take on an important project?
AT ITS CORE, the book is about the Rynecki paintings and the author’s quest to rescue her great-grandfather’s lost art legacy. Do you have family heirlooms that you’ve always been curious to know more about? What have you done to research your family’s history? Have you ever worked on your family tree?
ART SPEAKS to us in unique ways. Moshe Rynecki was an ethnographer of sorts, documenting Polish-Jewish life in the interwar years. What role do you think art plays in understanding life for Jews in Poland before the Holocaust? Looking at art more broadly, and at today’s social political issues, what role does art play in better understanding refugees and immigrants?
CHASING PORTRAITS IS a book and a documentary film. What parts of the book do you hope are in the documentary film? Why?