Auschwitz Art

If Dina Babbitt hadn't been such a talented artist, neither she nor her mother would have survived Auschwitz. Wielding her paintbrush as a talisman against evil, the young Czech Jew kept herself and her mother from the gas chambers by painting portraits of Gypsies for the notorious Dr. Josef Mengele, who was studying the camp's 13,000 Roma inmates as part of his so-called "racial research." Seven of the 11 portraits Babbitt completed are today in the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, grim reminders of the horrors of the camps. Now 82, Babbitt lives in Santa Cruz, Calif., and is writing a book about her experiences. Irish Art