Metadata: Estate of Georges Bloch
Collection
- Country:
- Switzerland
- Holding institution:
- Archives of Contemporary History at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archiv für Zeitgeschichte der ETH Zürich
- Postal address:
- Hirschengraben 62, CH-8092 Zurich
- Phone number:
- +41 44 632 40 03
- Web address:
- https://www.afz.ethz.ch/
- Email:
- afz@history.gess.ethz.ch
- Reference number:
- NL Georges Bloch
- Title:
- Estate of Georges Bloch
- Title (official language):
- Einzelbestand George Bloch
- Creator/accumulator:
- Bloch, Georges
- Date(s):
- 1901/1991
- Language:
- German
- Extent:
- 0.04 shelf metres
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- The only fragmentarily preserved collection mainly contains biographical material.
- Archival history:
- The material was transferred to the AfZ in 1999.
- Administrative/biographical history:
-
Georges Bloch was born in Zurich on 24 July 1901 as the son of Adolphe and Reine Bloch-Levy. He died there on 15 May 1984. Bloch was a textile dealer, art collector and philanthropist. He joined his father's textile business and completed foreign language training in Geneva and England. In 1922, he served in the Swiss military as a mountain artilleryman, but retired in the wake of an accident. In 1930, Bloch married Jenny Margot and took over his father's business. He designed his own fabric collections and in 1950, he started to collect works of Picasso. He donated one third of the collection to the Graphische Sammlung ETH Zurich in 1972, having been a member of its art commission from 1962 to 1972. Through further sales, he established the Georges and Jenny Bloch Foundation. In 1981, he was awarded a honorary doctorate from the University of Zurich and became a permanent guest of honour at ETH Zurich.
Bloch was cofounder of the Swiss Relief and Works Agency for Emigrant Children (SHEK), established in 1933. Together with other refugee helpers (Nettie Sutro-Katzenstein, Georgine Gerhard, Paul Vogt), SHEK assisted victims of the Second World War who were seeking refuge in Switzerland. Bloch worked in the refugee department of the Israelitische Cultusgemeinde Zürich (ICZ), the Organisation de Secours aux Enfants (OSE), the Verband Schweizerischer Jüdischer Fürsorgen (VSJF), the Schweizerische Zentralstelle für Flüchtlingshilfe (SZF), the Sachverständigen-Kommission für Flüchtlingsfragen as well as the joint commission for refugee children of the SHEK and the Swiss Red Cross. After 1945, Bloch became a member of various relief and non-profit organisations including the Swiss Red Cross, Pro Juventute, Pro Senectute, and Schweizer Europahilfe (later Swissaid). Bloch was cofounder of the Swiss children's village Kiryiat Ye’arim near Jerusalem..
- Subject terms:
- Personal records
- Finding aids:
- An online finding aid is available.
- Links to finding aids:
- http://onlinearchives.ethz.ch/
- Yerusha Network member:
- Jewish Museum Hohenems
- Author of the description:
- Severin Holzknecht; Jewish Museum of Hohenems; 2019
