Someone has tried to reconstruct the shattered shards of a culture destroyed. Multiple broken pieces of a monumental cup, spoons, painting fragments, and maybe a Hebrew letter are precariously reassembled. Makeshift and inadequate braces try to re-form the cup, but it will never hold water again. A blackbird sits ominously atop the rim of this fractured vessel looking back over its shoulder… for what? This is a broken world which despite heroic efforts, cannot be restored to anything close to its original glory.
Bak considers the titles he uses for his paintings complimentary and often even integral to the visual experience. “The Hunted Refuge” is particularly pithy and thought-provoking. A phrase like “The Hunted’s Refuge” or “The Hunted Refugee” would feel more explicit and definitive. The beauty of this title is its ability to capture the sentiment and interpretive ambiguity of both alternative titles. Is this feeble assemblage really a refuge? Perhaps it is the best that can be constructed given the circumstances. Who or what is the hunted, a displaced threatened person, or a possible place of safety for them?
Bak’s paintings exquisitely present a cruel and broken world within which he creates an indefatigable struggle to simply survive. However, as in this work, it is never clear if survival is possible which leads us immediately to ask, “How and why did we get to this place to start??!!” Perhaps this is the most important question we can try to answer.
Dr. Carl M. Herbert (Guest Writer)
BAK a Day, September 9, 2022
Vilna Gaon Museum of Jewish History (Samuel Bak Museum)
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