Oral History of Susan Quastel. Mrs. Quastel was born in Amsterdam in 1923. During the early part of WW2 she worked at the Jewish Hospital in Amsterdam. After the war she moved to London, where she had family. While in the UK, she trained to be a nurse at Charing Cross Hospital. She then went to Israel, where her sister lived, and worked at Hadassah Hospital. During her time in Israel, she met her husband, who was from Vancouver, at the Hebrew University. She moved to Canada with him and they got married here. In Vancouver, she worked for many Jewish organizations including Hadassah, The National Council of Jewish Women, the Vancouver chapter of Canadian Friends of The Hebrew University, and the Zack Gallery.

Oral history interview with Susan (nee Ricardo) Quastel, who was born in the Netherlands, 1923. She lost her sister and parents to the Holocaust. Susan worked as a nurse throughout the war in Holland, than began studied nursing and a course on matrons at Oxford. Susan came to Vancouver primarily because of her husband who was from Vancouver. Susan is a member of the National Council of Jewish Women, Vancouver chapter of Hadassah, Jewish Family Services, of Canadian Friends of the Hebrew University and has helped research at the Vancouver Holocaust Society.

Oral history interview with Simon Fallmann who was born in Germany. He spent his childhood in Holland during World War II. Later in life he studied and worked in bio-medical engineering; quasar infra-red photography and aero-nautical engineering.

Oral Interview with Sidi Schaffer for the JMABC Artists Scribe. Interviewed by Daniella Givon. Sidi goes over her family history in Romania, where she was born, and across Eastern Europe, and then details her immediate family in Canada. Sidi describes her artistic influences from her parents who were professional photographers after WWII, especially her mother who encouraged her to do art. Being born in 1938, some of Sidi’s earliest childhood memories are of fleeing from the Holocaust with her family. Sidi found art to be an escape from personal traumas, which eventually took her to art school in Bucharest where she met her husband, David. Sidi describes her and David’s time living in Israel, and eventually moving to Edmonton where she pursued more formal arts education. Sidi describes opportunities to show her printmaking and painted works, and teach arts across Canada. She also describes inspiration from nature, freedom of expression, and memories of the Holocaust. She outlines how the Gesher Project helped her develop as a Jewish artist, and how she produces Judaic influenced art with her sister.

Oral history interview with Reva Checov who was born in a small village in Russia in 1897. Later in life when she emigrated to Canada she went to McGill University and the University of British Columbia. Reva was involved in the Pioneer Women, National Council of Jewish Women, B'nai B'rith; Red Cross, Heart Foundation, Cancer Society ; Israeli Affairs and the Jewish National Fund among an assortment of other roles.

Summary: Oral Interview with Pnina Granirer for the JMABC Artists Scribe. Interviewed by Daniella Givon as a follow-up to an interview from 2021. Pnina recalls her earliest memories of producing art at school in Romania, and learning illustration and painting home decor in Haifa. She explains how her art career truly started when her and her husband moved to Illinois as she didn’t have a work visa and thus spent her time painting and crafting. She discusses inspiration from her children, mixing medias and art genres, and the exploration of making and learning. She talks about themes in her paintings coming from universal human experiences such as identity and existentialism, and the only painting she ever did in regards to the Holocaust and its showing in Tel Aviv. She speaks about her working in galleries and pushing for galleries to be made in Jewish institutions in Vancouver. Pnina talks about the creation of Artist in Our Midst and other art crawls in Vancouver, and her experiences teaching arts on Gabriola Island. She closes with an encouraging message for upcoming artists in Vancouver and the importance of art education in the art world’s future.

Oral Interview with Phyllis Serota for the JMABC Artists Scribe. Interviewed by Daniella Givon via remote Zoom call. Phyllis talks about her upbringing in inner city Chicago, Illinois and her relationship with both her immediate and extended family who lived in the same neighborhood. She speaks about her religious and secular education leading to being an artist, including her discovery of art when going to art classes at the Chicago Art Institute, and at the University of Victoria. Phyllis and her family relocated to Victoria due to the political climate of later 1960s America. Phyllis discusses her career as a painter including her painting style, her way of selling art, and painters who inspired her. She talks about her life in Victoria, and how her wife, place of residence, and institutions inspired her work. She closes with the importance of her place in the queer community, and the acceptance of her queer identity in the Jewish community.

Oral history interview with Paul Meyer who was born in Germany in 1916, the same as his parents. Speaks of his experiences during the second world war, in the concentration camps, escaping the Holocaust and emigrating to Canada. Paul was arrested in 1938 on Kristallnacht, taken to Dachau concentration camp but able to pay fines. Classisifed as 'friendly enemy aliens' upon entry into Canada due to German citizenship and Canada declaring war with Germany, had to report to RCMP once a month for a number of years. Paul and his brother started pottery business in Vancouver while their mother worked for the Red Cross.

Oral History Interview with Olga Campbell for the JMABC Artists Scribe. Interviewed by Bill Gruenthal. Olga Campbell was born in Iraq in 1943 and immigrated to Canada at the age of five in 1948. She explains her family’s experience with both Russian prison camps and the Holocaust during WWII, where they eventually made it safely to Canada. She discusses her journey as a social worker turned arts professional, including her time spent at Emily Carr and Capilano arts schools. As a second generation Holocaust survivor, Olga discusses how being Jewish and the associated inter-generational trauma of Holocaust survivorship has informed her works. Olga is a mixed-media artist, working in digital and traditional mediums, including collage and sculpture. She also published her art in a book focused on her family’s experience of the Holocaust that has fostered connections to her story, shared herein.

Oral History Interview with Mordechai (Robert) Edel for the JMABC Artists Scribe. Interviewed by Daniella Givon. Edel was born in England in 1949, but describes the life stories of him and his family spanning across Europe, North America and within Israel. These stories include his family's experience with the Holocaust and his growing up Jewish; they also detail his many professions before becoming an artist including musician or hazzan, hairdresser, and photographer. Edel's primary medium of art is oil painting which is in the impressionist style, and constantly informed by his Jewish faith and heritage. Edel tells anecdotes of some of the people he's met through his art within Canada and abroad, and his most memorable commissions along the way.