Whippany—A powerful art exhibit entitled Commonalities, presented by the Holocaust Council of Greater MetroWest, is displaying donated works of art by Yonia Fain, Marsha Marx, John Less and Chas Palminteri. The works all share a common theme of the Holocaust. The exhibit is open to the public and will be on view through November 18 at the Gaelen West Gallery at the Aidekman Family Jewish Community Campus in Whippany. All are welcome to join us at an opening reception on October 27 at 7 p.m. and have a chance to meet Chas Palminteri, the only exhibited artist still living.

Yonia Fain and John Less both survived the Holocaust by escaping to Shanghai. Whether they knew one another is unknown. Fain was an adult at the time, a graduate of the art Academy of Vilnius, and was able to reach Shanghai with the help of the Righteous Rescuer Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat stationed in Lithuania. John Less was a child from Germany when he and his parents fled through Lithuania and eventually found sanctuary in Shanghai. The Less family immigrated to the United States after the war.  A self-taught artist since childhood, Less would become the art director for Bambergers in Newark, settle in Millburn, raise two children with his wife, Miriam, and continue to paint and design.

Fain, meanwhile, settled in Mexico City for several years where he worked with famed artists Diego Rivera and Rafael Tumayo before immigrating to the US. He worked at New York University and the Brooklyn Museum, and eventually became a professor at Hofstra University. He lived to be a 100 years old and left his entire estate to the university, which generously donated many of his paintings and drawings to Holocaust museums.

Marsha Marx, a native of Newark, received an MFA from Yale University and lived for a time in Mexico City’s art colony where she no doubt would have known Tumayo, Rivera and his wife, Frida Kahlo, as well as Yonia Fain. She was inspired by the Holocaust to create more than 30 paintings and sculptures. These works were on display at the opening of the Houston Holocaust Museum. Her brother, Kelly Marx, a Short Hills resident, donated his late sister’s work to our Holocaust Council.

Chas Palminteri, also a native of Newark, is an award-winning artist and sculptor whose work has been included in the Gaelen’s Annual Art juried exhibition for the last three years. Like Less, he too worked as an art director.

“This exhibit is an amazing intersection of commonalities between these four artists who all drew inspiration from the Holocaust and wanted their work to stand as reminders of the past and warnings to future generations,” says Holocaust Council Director Barbara Wind.

For more information on the exhibit or the opening, contact Jamie Carus at 973-929-3067 or [email protected].

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