Bernstein in Gary

By Chris Sheid, Published October 27, 2006

Chicago artist and Holocaust survivor Gerda Meyer Bernstein creates large-scale installation pieces that address important social issues. “The Hooded March,” which currently is in its first-ever public showing at the IU Northwest Savannah Gallery for Contemporary Art, combines stark images of racial oppression—segregated restroom doors, wooden crosses and white sheets symbolic of the Ku Klux Klan—with imposing lists of recorded hate crimes and their perpetrators. Bernstein completed the piece in the 1980s. Most of her installation works take about one year to complete; with its incorporation of exhaustive information on hate crimes and hate groups, “The Hooded March” took her two years to finish.

“It’s hard labor. All of my pieces are labor-intensive,” she said.

“Before I left Germany, I decided that if I got out, I would speak out,” said Bernstein, who lived through the infamous Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) terror action against German Jews in November 1938. “If people had spoken out in Germany, Hitler wouldn’t have been able to accomplish what he did. What I am trying to say (through my art) is that it’s important to speak out. Your voice has to be heard. I want to make people think about these things and react emotionally.”

Bernstein left Germany at age 14, bound for London aboard one of the last kindertransport ships before that child-emigration program ceased in 1939. She eventually made her way to Ellis Island.

“I am very grateful to be in America,” she said.

Bernstein said “The Hooded March,” which runs through Nov. 10, is meant to remind people that hate crimes, racial or otherwise, continue today despite lessons learned from the Holocaust and other tragedies.

“I am so happy to do this show here (in Indiana) because in the early days the KKK was very strong here. This was one of the strongholds. A lot of people don’t realize that the KKK still functions in this country in such an active way even today, and particularly now that they have become involved with the neo-Nazis.”

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