Commemorating October 7 Through Art

Across Orthodox communities in Israel and the Diaspora, October 7 is being commemorated in time-honored ways: reciting Tehillim, giving tzedakah, studying Torah in memory of the kedoshim, and commissioning new sifrei Torah.  But alongside these traditional acts, a different form of commemoration has emerged: artistic expression. Over the past two years, the frum world has turned to the arts to process October 7 and its aftermath.  

“Visual art has a unique power to communicate what words cannot,” wrote Miriam Leah Gamliel and Esther Leah Marchette—directors of ATARA, the Arts and Torah Association, which caters to female Torah-observant artists—for an October 7 exhibit catalog that closed this past winter. The exhibit, October 7: Terror, Faith, Hope, which ran in partnership with ATARA, offered “a sacred space” and “underscores the healing power of creative expression and highlights the extraordinary depth and talent within our community.” 

Finding solace in the arts, the Orthodox community has increasingly embraced creative expression to make sense of the devastation. The Brooklyn exhibit, mounted for four months at the Hadas Gallery of the Chabad of Clinton Hill and Pratt Institute, was one notable example. Curated by Abigail H. Meyer, a veteran art historian, it presented three threads: terror, faith and humor. “Three different stories I’m trying to tell through art,” Meyer explained. 

An Orthodox Boston native, Meyer conceived of the exhibit (artsandtorah.org/october7) as a way to bring a frum perspective to memorialization. “I wanted to do something for the frum community to mark October 7.” A day school graduate and longtime scholar of Jewish art history, she gathered works from a wide range of contributors, ultimately curating a collection of roughly 100 pieces. The exhibit included Shabbat candles, yahrtzeit candles, intact and torn “kidnapped” posters of hostages, images of Israeli soldiers and scenes of Chassidic life. 

This, Meyer said, was likely the first Orthodox-led art show in the US to approach the subject with sensitivity to religious norms. The artists—ATARA members—represent “performers, composers, writers and producers who create new works or foster opportunities for others in arts training and expression.” The media on display ranged from photography and watercolor to oil painting, sculpture, calligraphy and textiles. 

A grandchild of Holocaust survivors and an art historian, Meyer felt the responsibility to mark the horrors of October 7 and their aftermath. “I have to do this,” she told herself. She contacted artists she knew, invited them to submit works, and put out a call on social media for other contributions. The creators varied in age, religious background, political stance and professional experience—from established artists like Archie Rand to singer-songwriter Lipa Schmeltzer to complete novices. 

Now a private consultant and museum educator, Meyer previously worked at Kestenbaum & Company and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She curated the October 7 exhibit pro bono. “Five months of pro bono work,” she noted. She saw it as a way of incorporating “testimony taken in the form of art to memorialize the kedoshim, salute the fallen soldiers and continue our prayers for those taken hostage.” 

Over the past two years, the frum world has turned to the arts to process October 7 and its aftermath.

In Jerusalem, photographer, painter and poet Jared Bernstein has similarly turned to art to navigate grief. A Baltimore native and ba’al teshuvah, Bernstein has lived in Israel for roughly two decades, building a career as a professional photographer. After October 7, he began producing oil and acrylic paintings, poetry and a photographic series exploring a message of “hope and emunah.” 

In his 2021 autobiography, Courageous Chicken (Ktav), Bernstein describes his “experiences of searching for G-d and gaining the courage to transform my life”—his path to becoming a religious Jew. “Despite the money and status I had,” he writes, “I wasn’t happy. The book is a confrontation with my identity.” 

Once he became an Orthodox Jew, Bernstein began to inject optimism into everything he created. His goal was to “build emunah,” faith in G-d and in the nation’s future. “G-d is running the show.” One rabbi told him that his post–October 7 artwork “is different,” containing “much hope and positivity.” 

Photography has become a particularly potent medium for Bernstein, offering a way to process grief while searching for hidden truths.  

After October 7, Bernstein embarked on a photography project centered—symbolically—around light and shadows, his metaphor for discovering hidden truths. “The world revealed itself. We saw the hate, the antisemitism.” 

“Light creates the shadows, and the shadows reveal truth,” he says. 

His project is a collage of images of people’s shadows. Unidentified people. People standing and running and pointing. In other words, any people in Israel, a nation living in the shadow of vulnerability. “Photography has become my way of healing,” he says. “Through the lens, I process my pain, find light in darkness.” 

His artwork, he says, offers a sense of control, counters the feeling of vulnerability that many people in Israel experienced after the Hamas onslaught, and offers an outlet for the “pain and suffering” that many Israelis have felt. 

It was especially important to act as a voice for Israelis, he says, because, living in Jerusalem, far from Gaza, he felt physically disconnected from the scene of the horrors. 

So he set out “immediately” to put into physical and literary images the hopelessness that many people in the country went through. “We are connected through our vulnerability.” 

Bernstein’s post–October 7 paintings feature images of flailing figures; his poetry, more references to flailing. 

“Through my creativity,” he says, “I don’t just express my sorrow—I share in theirs [the relatives and friends of the Hamas victims, and anyone affected by the terrorism], holding space for our collective loss, our resilience and our longing for something whole again.” 

Ultimately, whether through Brooklyn galleries or Jerusalem studios, these Orthodox-led artistic efforts illuminate a truth at once painful and sustaining: Even in the aftermath of horror, art offers a path to commemoration, healing and hope. “Even in brokenness,” Bernstein says, “creating helps me heal.” 

“Optimistic Defeatist” 165 x 193 cm. (64.9 x 75.9 in.) acrylic, oilstick and collage. Courtesy of Jared Bernstein

Research for this article was provided by Steve Lipman.