Jan Mieczyslaw Komski, a survivor of the Auschwitz death camps, is an artist whose powerful paintings and drawings from the Holocaust are overshadowed only by the miraculous story of his own life.

"Auschwitz Eyewitness: The Work of Jan Komski" will open at DePaul University April 12 with a reception in the Richardson Library, 2350 N. Kenmore Ave., Haber Lounge, from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Komski will attend the opening reception.

He will also give a special lecture, "A conversation with Jan Komski," on April 14 at 2:30 p.m. in Room 314 of the Richardson Library. The event will be moderated by Rabbi Roy Furman and is part of DePaul’s Memory and Conscience Series.

The exhibition and the lecture are free and open to the public. They are part of a yearlong centennial celebration at DePaul. More than 50 of Komski’s pen and ink drawings and paintings will be exhibited at DePaul through June 15. This showing marks only the second time that the haunting pieces have been exhibited. The exhibition premiered at the Holocaust Museum Houston in early 1998.

Komski had barely begun his fine art career before the outbreak of World War II. In 1939, once the war engulfed his native Krakow, Poland, Komski decided to join the Polish underground. He was arrested by German troops while attempting to flee Poland to join the Polish army in France. He was among the first trainload of prisoners to arrive at Auschwitz on June 14, 1940.

"During my incarceration, I worked as a portrait artist for the Nazis and also created architectural renderings; my profession helped me to survive," he said. He credits his artistic talent for saving his life. The 83-year-old concentration camp survivor and his wife live in Arlington, Va., where he paints – mostly landscapes – daily.

"One of Komski’s more notable paintings, "Big Escape" chronicles his own daring escape from Auschwitz in December of 1942 with two fellow prisoners. The threesome managed to flee in a horse-drawn cart that concealed part of the camp’s labor operations files or employment records.

With a new name and forged papers, Komski attempted to reach Warsaw but was apprehended and badly injured in a round up in Krakow. He was taken back to Auschwitz after a seven-month stay in a local prison. Komski spent two more years in various concentration camps. Even after liberation in April 1945, Komski remained in a Bavarian displaced persons camp for four years before he was allowed to come to the United States. Once settled in the United States, he found work as a graphic artist at the Washington Post. It would be years before he could paint what he had seen and experienced in the Nazi death camps, paintings that are included in the show.

"I was determined to remember those who perished in the camp, even if I had to revisit the places of great suffering and annihilation," he said. "My memory produced the vivid details which were imbedded in my soul forever. And so I began in 1987 to uncover the painful images of the past."

The Richardson Library is open from 8 a.m. to midnight, Monday to Thursday; 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., Saturday; and noon to midnight, Sunday. For more information about the exhibition, call the Richardson Library office, 773/325-7849.