Contemporary gallery owners Paula Jackson and Robert Teed have turned artists for the latest exhibition at the New School House Gallery in York.

The multi-disciplinary I Am Human show explores human rights and equalities as part of the city’s Holocaust Memorial Day programme with support from the City of York Council and National Lottery through Arts Council England.

Paula and Robert have created a new work that takes up the whole of the gallery’s back wall.

Entitled The Holocaust Survivors’ Library, this photography and audio installation concentrates on the stories of three survivors of the Holocaust who now live in the Leeds area: Eugene Black, from Hungary, and Iby Knill and Trude Silman, both from the former Czechoslovakia.

“We met them through the Holocaust Survivors Friendship Association in Leeds, where Eugene’s daughter, Lilian Black, is a real driving force. Lilian suggested Iby and Trude, who let us record their stories.”

Those stories – four from Eugene, three from Iby, two from Trude – can be heard on headphone sets placed on the library exhibit made up of the spines of books and portraits of the three survivors.

“The book design idea partly came from when you see Eugene, Iby and Trude sitting in their living rooms with their books, which are symbols of their civilisation, and they’ve all had to rebuild a civilised home away from their homeland,” says Robert.

“We’ve tried to hint in this exhibit that there was no home to return to; they all had to start again from nothing.

“And then there’s the metaphorical story of the burning of the books in Nazi Germany, and also the Jewish saying of ‘The People of the Book’ that is reflected in our work.”

I Am Human also features works by celebrated ceramicists Professor Stephen Dixon, Dr Claudia Clare and Magdolene Dystra, as well as textiles by Alison Welsh, that focus on issues pertinent to genocide such as slavery, asylum, persecution and human rights.

“We wanted artists who were politically engaged, and we felt that ceramics especially had a contemporary resonance,” says Robert. “We approached each of them individually, and though their responses have been very different in terms of artistic practice, there are similarities in their use of narratives and surfaces.”

Robert hopes visitors to I Am Human will be encouraged to learn lessons from the atrocities of the past.

“When you speak to survivors such as Eugene, Iby and Trude, you realise that what drives them to tell their horrifying and humbling life stories is a passion to educate,” he says. “If we don’t learn about these atrocities, and then continue to remember them, the danger is it will be all the more easy for such atrocities to happen again.”

During the exhibition, the gallery is holding a series of free Saturday events that will include Eugene Black’s talk on February 19 at 2pm; Magdolene Dykstra’s clay workshops on February 26 from noon to 3pm; and a screening of Untold Stories on the same day.

• I Am Human: Remembering The Holocaust Through Art runs at New School House Gallery, Peasholme Green, York, until February 26.

Charles Hutchinson