Germantown Academy, led by Art Across the Academy Co-Directors Truesdell House Head and Upper School Art Teacher Sara Krupnick-Ritz and Lower School Art Department Coordinator Jess Grisafi, welcomed artist Reena Brooks to campus as this year's artist-in-residence.

Reena Brooks is a printmaker and mixed media artist whose layered, abstract work emerges from her mother’s life before, during, and after the Holocaust. Through shape, color, texture, experimental printmaking, hand dyed textiles, and vintage ephemera, she builds quiet in-between spaces where memory returns and loss and love coexist. These works invite viewers to slow down, reflect, and remain with the lasting presence of lived experience. 

"We were deeply honored to welcome Reena Brooks as our artist-in-residence," said Ritz. "Her stunning, intricately layered work reflects not only her mother’s journey during the Holocaust as a 15-year-old girl in Auschwitz, but also the shared contours of our universal human experience. In a world that can be astonishing in its beauty and, at times, profoundly, unimaginably difficult, her art calls us to remember what happened, and to embrace the love and resilience within us. Her work reminds us to answer our collective call to use our strength in service of goodness and human dignity."

Students and faculty from all divisions, including the Upper School Jewish Student Association, had the opportunity to tour her work hanging in the Arts Center and spend time asking her about her life and her craft. 

Brooks is currently the co-President of the Cheltenham Printmakers Guild. She teaches a variety of art and craft classes throughout the surrounding communities, including knitting at Stitch Central in Glenside. In 2024, she received "Best in Show" at Artists of Yardley Art Center for an embroidered portrait of her mother, along with several other honors recognizing her work in other juried shows. 

“Reena’s time with our community reached far beyond the gallery walls," said Grisafi. "In speaking with students and faculty, she offered not only insight into her artistic practice, but an invitation to listen more closely to our own histories. She urged us to ask questions while our loved ones are still here, to honor where we come from, and to safeguard the stories entrusted to us. She left us with a powerful reminder that remembrance is an act of love and responsibility, something we can choose to carry forward with intention.”