Towards the end of the Maus series, Vladek takes out pictures of his relatives and recounts their lives to Artie. Vladek shows the destruction brought upon his family by the holocaust through his recounts of the people in these pictures. Some die in the holocaust while others commited suicide after surviving it. The amount of deaths and tragedies that occured in Vladek's family can represent what the families of Jewish people experienced in general during the holocaust. The panels are also overlapped by the stacks of photos piling together. Assuming that each photo represented a family member, Art uses the photos to show the amount of people in his family that had to experience the holocaust. Art confirms the existence of these people through the photos. They are gone but not forgotten, the pictures are a way for Vladek and the descendants of Vladek to remember the deceased. Like the memorial of the holocaust, it is a reminder of the nightmares humanity is capable to create and the consequences it brings upon us. We may never be able to achieve full empathy with those who went through then holocaust but we do understand the sentimental value behind each picture and each serial number on the holocaust memorial. Hopefully it will make us avoid causing something similar to the holocaust from repeating again. The story behind each of the photos ultimately tell the story of the resilience and strength of the Jewish people since they suffered heavy loses but still continue to live on.
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