Artist Jonathan Palmer's father davened the three prayers during the 1930s in Lithuania. Palmer repeated them each morning in the 1960s at an Orthodox Jewish day school in South Africa. At a shul in Boston in the 1990s, Palmer's son recited them on becoming a bar mitzvah. That's when Palmer realized three generations of his family had found the Sh'ma, kaddish and kiddush deeply familiar and comforting.

Now, in the Gallery next to Hebrew College's Berenson Hall, Palmer is exhibiting a set of three large abstract oil paintings inspired by—and incorporating the text of—these three daily prayers. "When I immigrated to the United States, I looked for a familiar anchor to my past," recalls the Newton Centre-based artist. "Although I often found the music in American temples unfamiliar, I recognized the profound visual impact of the familiar letters and words of these central prayers of Judaism."

A practicing psychiatrist and psychoanalyst for more than two decades, Palmer acknowledges a strong link between his profession and painting. "The content of my art is very much influenced by an attempt to express unconscious thoughts and feelings," he says.

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