#4: Kaddish for Rachel Corrie

Kaddish for Rachel Corrie, oil on canvas, 10’ x 6’, 2006.  I made this painting in tribute to Rachel Corrie a 23 year old American peace activist who was killed March 16, 2003 as she stood in front of an Israeli Defense Force bulldozer and tried to stop it from razing a Palestinian home in Gaza, The bulldozer crushed her.  A play was compiled from her diaries and opened at The Royal Court Theatre in London in April, 2005.  The play, My Name is Rachel Corrie, enjoyed two successful runs in London, but a New York production was stymied by political pressure.  The Diogenes Society subsequently presented a reading of the play at the community church in Elizabethtown. The play eventually opened in New York in October of 2006.  The title of the painting is a reference to these lines from the mourning Kaddish. “ He who makes peace upon the heights, may he make peace upon us and upon all Israel.”