Fré Cohen

Frederika Sophia "Fré" Cohen (11 August 1903 – 14 June 1943) was a Dutch artist and graphic designer.

Early life Frederika Sophia Cohen was born on 11 August 1903 in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. She was the oldest daughter of diamond cutter Levie Cohen, a member of the Social-Democrat Jewish community in Amsterdam.

Cohen had a large output of rather varied printed matter, from window bills to bookplates, diplomas, illustrations, running headers, baby announcements and postcards. There are also some three-dimensional works such as boxes and scale models. She created folders and maps for Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, in a modernist style using gold, red and blue. Besides, she made paintings, portraits, drawings, woodcuts and linocuts.

Later years Under the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands that started in 1940, all Jews were in danger. Fre Cohen went into hiding in 1941 and stayed at friends' houses and remote farm houses consecutively in Amsterdam, Diemen, Rotterdam, Winterswijk and Borne. During that period she continued to work illegally, when she could. On 12 June 1943, she was arrested by the Germans in Borne. In haste, she took the pills she had hoarded for such an emergency. After two days in a coma, she died on 14 June 1943 at the age of 39 at a hospital in Hengelo. She is buried at the Jewish cemetery in Hengelo (Dennenbosweg 44).

Her sister managed to survive the war and afterwards put a simple tombstone on the unmarked grave in the Jewish cemetery in Hengelo, where also her father and brother are remembered, both murdered in the war. Part of Fré Cohen's work was destroyed by officers of the Sicherheitsdienst, who raided the places where she worked, but much has been preserved. The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam houses a large collection of her graphic and original works.