Between “Kan” and “Sham”: Commemorative Materiality of the Łopuchowo Forest

The article considers the ambiguous dynamics of the Łopuchowo Forest, a significant location of Holocaust commemoration among Israeli groups, as the location of the massacre of Tykocin Jews. Its site includes not only marked mass graves and a central monument(s), but also numerous smaller vehicles of memory placed there by Israeli visitors. The collection of lesser artefacts, affected over time by the acting materiality of an organic environment, contributes to the meaning of this forest memorial space. Following these material remnants through autoethnography, the Łopuchowo Forest is approached in terms of different connotations that forest evokes in the Polish and Israeli memory cultures. Considering the dichotomous notions of here (kan) and there (sham) at play in the Polish-Israeli imaginary, the article addresses the role of the Łopuchowo Forest as an Israeli traumascape.