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From an interview with Dr. Judah Shapiro on station WEVD, November 7, 1979

Anna Walinska: 

I have been asked, "Why the theme of the Holocaust in your work?" The answer is simply that the theme of the Holocaust has been an inescapable compulsion. I have returned again and again to its tragic aspects - The Victims, The Survivors, The Naked and The Dead, The Elegies and the mournful landscapes of The Earth Bears Witness.

Elie Wiesel this past week in the New York Times has spoken for all of us in his "Pilgrimage to the Country of Night".

For me, words are difficult. My work, the paintings and drawings of images in flight, embracing, parting, being herded together for deportation, the bodies in the pits - are all metaphors for the Jewish community disappearing in the Holocaust. With each image I have attempted time and again to renew, to deepen and to strengthen the statement. The lack of color - the darkness of the paintings point to an approaching end. They are parts of me. They are my only children. They must speak for me.

And when people ask, "Are you a survivor? How did you happen to dedicate yourself to the Holocaust in your work?" I must speak of my parents. Generations of my immediate family were and are engaged in Jewish public service. How could I help but be profoundly involved and influenced by their activities. How I wish my father were alive to see one of his dreams realized - his name over the doors and inside the doors as well, of the Museum of the Jewish Diaspora, The Beth Hatefutzot, to which he gave so much of himself!

Just think what a remarkable experience it is for me to have the opportunity of showing these works, 93 in all, in the ambiance of the Museum of Religious Art of the magnificent Cathedral of St. John the Divine. And indeed, it was at their invitation to do so years before the film of the Holocause was made. Bishop Moore and Dean Morton are indeed making wonderful things happen here in all fields of endeavor.

An unforgettable and unique experience connected with this exhibit is to read the comments people write in the guest book daily, and to listen to their stories.

One writes, "The pain shrieks. Why didn't and why doesn't the world listen?'

Another says,"The vast windows in this room allow today's crystal autum light to bless these images and I see myself reflected beside the doomed faces - as it should be. For these are my people, but I live and remember."

Yet another's words, "Being only just born when these events occurred and these not being 'my people' except in the larger sense of all people being brothers and sisters, nevertheless I see my face in these works reflected as sorrowfully."

A women writes, "Thank you for reflecting my pain so vividly".