This publication is only available in Dutch.

It is May 14, 1940, just before half past two in the afternoon, when German fighter planes set the city center of Rotterdam ablaze. In the days that follow, artists search in vain for their studio among the rubble. There is great anger, but it soon becomes apparent that the destroyed center also offers opportunities, at least for those who are not Jewish or communist. While the art scene flourishes and the city rises like a phoenix from the ashes, there is no longer a place for these artists in society.

De vuurvogelgeneratie certainly does not paint a complete picture of the Rotterdam art world during the occupation years, but zooms in on a dozen artists who each related to the bombing and National Socialist cultural policy in their own way. In this way, the book makes tangible the various dilemmas that occurred during the war, painful choices to which no attention was paid for a long time after the war, in the light of reconstruction.

Featured artists:
Herman Bieling, Wim Chabot, Henk Chabot, Antoon Derkzen van Angeren, Wally Elenbaas, Jaap Gidding, Aad de Haas, Esther Hartog, Fie Hartog, Dolf Henkes, Deborah Sanson