Vera Frenkel’s video and installation work focuses on the complexities of intercultural relations and identities, always raising issues of uncertainty, fantasy, and cultural expectations. Born in Bratislava in 1938, carried by her mother out of Europe on the eve of war, Frenkel came to Canada as a teenager, studied sociology at McGill University, and turned to art to explore the passages and perplexities of Canadian diasporic life. While there is little that is insistently Jewish in her art, the work draws unmistakeably on modern Jewish experience, and extends its impact to a wider, multi-cultural world.

My paper focuses on four works. With a ground-breaking use of internet technology, String Games (1974) plays on the game of Cat’s Cradle to link disparate and distant communities. …from the Transit Bar (1992–) constructs a train station bar as a site of social and political flight, with Yiddish prominent among a babble of languages. Body Missing (1993), an interactive internet site, continues the journey—as viewers follow clues in pursuit of the Shoah’s ‘missing bodies.’ The recent video installation Blue Train (2014) again invokes flight and promise, melding danger and opportunity. With Jewish history and experience a recurrent theme, Frenkel’s art explores the pressures of and pleasures in Canada’s cultural mosaic.

薇拉·弗伦克尔（Vera Frenkel）的视频和装置作品着眼于跨文化关系和身份的复杂性，总是引发不确定性，幻想和文化期望的问题。弗伦克尔（Frenkel）于1938年出生于布拉迪斯拉发（Bratislava），在战争前夕由母亲带出欧洲，十几岁时来到加拿大，在麦吉尔大学（McGill University）学习社会学，并转向艺术探索加拿大流放生活的经历和困惑。尽管在她的艺术中坚持犹太教的人很少，但作品毫无疑问地汲取了现代犹太人的经验，并将其影响扩展到更广泛的多元文化世界。

我的论文集中于四篇作品。借助互联网技术的突破性应用，String Games（1974）玩着Cat's Cradle的游戏，将遥远的社区联系在一起。…来自Transit Bar （1992–）建造了火车站酒吧，作为社交和政治飞行的场所，意第绪语在众多语言中脱颖而出。交互式互联网站点《身体失踪》（1993）继续前进，观众跟随线索追寻Shoah的“失踪尸体”。最近的录像装置《蓝色火车》（2014年）再次唤起了飞行与希望，融合了危险与机遇。弗兰克尔（Frenkel）拥有犹太历史并经历了一个反复出现的主题，他的艺术探索了加拿大文化马赛克中的压力和愉悦。