According to Langer, her winning piece From Out of the Depths says: “Our past is haunted by the atrocities of the Holocaust but our future is strong.”
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February 26, 2009
Erica Langer has always liked to doodle. But the West Orange student never really thought of herself as an artist. And she certainly didn’t spend her gap year in Israel this year with art on her mind. But the ground underneath her has just shifted. This 18-year-old “doodler” just tied for second place in an art competition sponsored by Yeshiva University.
The winners were announced at a Feb. 17 reception at a gallery on the YU campus in Jerusalem, where all the works submitted were on exhibit. “I was amazed at the quality of some of the entries and was almost a little embarrassed because I certainly didn’t feel like I was in the same class” as the other works, Langer said.
When she heard her work From Out of the Depths declared second-place winner, she said, “My heart started racing. I was so shocked. I had to stand up and give a little description of my drawing and what it means to me, which made my heart race even faster because of my fear of public speaking.”
Langer is one of 28 young Jewish women in post-high school programs in Israel who participated in Yeshiva University’s second annual S. Daniel Abraham Israel Program Art Competition; the program is YU’s gap-year program in Israel. Students enrolled have been accepted to YU or Stern College for Women and can attend one of over 50 yeshivot in Israel and gain full credit for their studies. The art competition is open to women enrolled at Stern College.
The winners were selected by a panel of five judges: Israeli artists Daniel Azoulay, Penny Harow, and Jordana Klein and Stern College art professors Susan Gardner and Traci Tullius. Pieces were judged on a scale of one to four in six categories: use of color, technical skill, strength of composition, concept, expression of theme, and creativity.
Submissions were accepted on the themes of Ahavat Yisrael (love of all Jews), Torah U’Maddah (the interplay of Torah and secular knowledge), Jerusalem, Eretz Yisrael (land of Israel), or Geulah (redemption); written explanations of the works’ meaning were required.
Yael Medresh of Mexico City won first place and a $500 prize for her drawing The Lord Will Bare His Holy Arm in the Sight of All.
Langer tied for second-place honors with Eliana Kohanchi of Queens for her piece Mama Rachel, an interpretation of the Tomb of Rachel created from paint, mosaics, and sand. Three students tied for third place: Rami Diamond for her drawing depicting a fading “photo” of Holocaust survivors, Daniela Rosenthal for her painting Sheyirbu Zechuyotainu K’Rimon (May our Merits Increase Like the Seeds of a Pomegranate), and Leora Niderberg for the advanced painting techniques displayed in her landscape portrait of Nachal Arad. All the winning entries will be displayed in the fall at Stern College for Women’s Beren Campus in New York City.
‘Blown away’
Langer said she got the idea for her winning entry from a photo she saw in a magazine of a man seemingly coming out of the Holocaust with barbed wire wrapped around his wrist, reaching up and grasping the hand of a young boy wearing tefillin. “I was really blown away by the image and the powerful message and decided to recreate it in a pencil drawing,” she wrote NJJN in an e-mail conversation from Israel, where she is studying at the Tiferet Center for Advanced Torah Studies for Women in Ramat Beit Shemesh.
Erica Langer
She works in pencil and watercolor, Langer said, mostly because she has no training in any other media. “This year, while studying at Tiferet, I started drawing a lot in my spare time and developed a true passion for art and design,” she wrote. “As the year progressed I noticed that my sketches were getting better and better, which excited me. When I heard about the contest I thought it would be a good opportunity to test whether or not my talent matched my enthusiasm.”
The contest, she said, boosted her confidence and her interest in art, and she now envisions herself becoming a graphic designer or architect. In the meantime, she is trying to take in as much as she can during her year in Israel, which she described as “an opportunity to be introspective, learn, grow spiritually, make new friends, develop talents, and develop a love for the land of Israel.”
“The competition is an opportunity for students who are artistically inclined to express themselves in a way that they wouldn’t have been able to do in a year of such intense Torah learning,” said YU Israel adviser Elana Kohn in a prepared statement. “It’s designed to enhance their year. They can engage their creativity within the framework of a Torah-oriented program.”
‘Our future is strong’
Work: From Out of the Depths
Artist: Erica Langer, 18
Hometown: West Orange
Parents: Ellie and Fred Langer
High school: Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School, Livingston
Synagogue: Ahawas Achim B’nai Jacob & David, West Orange
Israel study: Tiferet Center for Advanced Torah Studies for Women in Ramat Beit Shemesh
Art training: an RKYHS studio art class
Career plans: graphic design/architecture
About the work: “From Out of the Depths represents the plight of am Yisrael. Our past is haunted by the atrocities of the Holocaust but our future is strong.
“Like a torch, the strength in the forearm passes from the trauma of the past generation to the hope and power of the new generation. The Jewish experience has evolved from the bonds of barbed wire to the straps of the tefillin — the ultimate symbol of Jewish prayer and perseverance.
“This sketch was done in pencil for its starkness. Color would have detracted from its impact. The gray tones represent the bleakness of the Shoa and the ashes of the six million Jews who perished. The darker tones of the tefillin in contrast represent the renewed strength of the Jewish people.”
— from a description by the artist for the S. Daniel Abraham Israel Program Art Competition
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