Expressing the Jewish Experience Through Artworks : Culture: The six-week ‘Celebration: The Jewish Experience’ offers workshops, theater events, a cantors’ concert and a cooking class.

Pat Payne, a 10-year-old from Point Vicente Elementary School in Rancho Palos Verdes, didn’t know a whole lot about Judaism until a visit the other morning to the Palos Verdes Art Center.

But after he and his classmates viewed a slide show and were taken on a tour of the art center’s rich exhibit of Jewish art, Pat was something of a junior expert.

“I learned a lot about all the Jewish holidays,” he said. “They told us about Hanukkah, Purim and Yom Kippur . . . and that flat bread . . . “

“Matzo,” piped up another youngster.

Pat and his classmates are among the reasons why more than 100 people spent nearly a year creating “Celebration: The Jewish Experience,” a six-week extravaganza--continuing through March 6--of art exhibits, workshops, lectures and theater events, library story hours, a cantors’ concert and even a cooking class.

Rabbi Marc Steven Dworkin, director of the Southern Region Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles, which is co-sponsoring “Celebration” with the art center, calls it a window “to the beauty and possibilities and excitement that exist within Jewish life.”

For non-Jews, it is an introduction to a new world with ancient roots. And for Jews, it is “a raising of consciousness . . . to show them the full possibility to participate in Jewish life,” he said.

Deedee Rechtin, art center program director, said the various programs “seem to cover most of the needs to reach schoolchildren, families and adults, and it allows for a really in-depth experience.” She said that 1,600 Palos Verdes Peninsula schoolchildren are expected to see the art center exhibits before the celebration ends.

Jean Abarbanel, co-curator of the art center show, said she is excited about sharing Jewish traditions in an area where many may know little about them. “The South Bay is not like Fairfax Avenue, where everyone is familiar with Jewish life,” she said.

According to Dworkin, there are 40,000 Jews in the South Bay, out of a Los Angeles County total of 600,000. “It’s not staggering here, but if you compare it with cities around the country, it’s considered a large community,” he said.

The heart of “Celebration” are the exhibits at the art center, located at 5504 W. Crestridge Road, which will be on view from 1 to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

The main Beckstrand Gallery is given over to artworks--from the 15th Century to the present--that are used in many Jewish rites and celebrations. The Collectors’ Galley has textiles by Laurie Gross, who uses the traditional Jewish prayer shawl as a model for her work. The Norris Film Gallery is showing photos of Jewish life around the world--from the Los Angeles Orthodox community to Soviet Jews--by Bernard Mendoza and Bill Aron.

The Beckstrand almost bursts with the world of Judaism in works loaned by Jewish museums, private collectors and some of the artists. Wedding canopies are suspended from the ceiling, and two mannequins wear richly embroidered wedding costumes.

Large and colorful marriage contracts are on the walls, and exhibit cases contain prayer shawls, elaborate Torahs both old and new, tiny mezuzas and toy Hanukkah tops, called dreidels. There are 10 menorahs, including a Baroque candelabra once owned by film director George Cukor and a modern high-tech version in several colors.

According to Abarbanel and co-curator Marcia Reines Josephy, Jewish art--which had its origins after the exodus from Egypt--has always been associated with Jewish celebrations and rituals and meant to be used, not just admired. Abarbanel called the exhibit a journey in art “through the daily and yearly living of one’s life as a Jew.”

She said many young Jewish artists--silversmiths, ceramists, weavers and potters--are continuing to celebrate their roots in art. And some artists taking part in “Celebration” reflect this.

Ruth Shapiro, a silversmith exhibiting a Torah breastplate and a mezuza in the show, says her art perpetuates a “culture that has gone on for thousands of years.”

Ruth Merritt, whose wall hanging incorporates the Hebrew alphabet, said that creating Jewish art is “more natural for me than to go out and paint a landscape.”

Photographer Mendoza, whose Jewish ancestors left Spain in 1657 to escape persecution, said he began photographing Orthodox Jews in Los Angeles five years ago to develop his “latent Judaism.” And in the process, he said, he discovered a timeless, romantic religious community undisturbed by change.

As a part of “Celebration,” a South Bay temple for the first time will host the Pacific Southwest Regional Cantors’ Concert, in which 10 cantors from throughout Los Angeles will sing everything from sacred music to pop hits. It will take place Feb. 10 at 8 p.m. at Congregation Ner Tamid, 5721 Crestridge Road, Rancho Palos Verdes. The cost is $15, with proceeds going to a cantors’ scholarship fund.

Veteran actor Nehemiah Persoff will present his one-man show about Eastern European Jewish life, “Tales of Sholom Aleichem,” Feb. 11 at 4 p.m. at the Norris Theater, Crossfield Drive and Indian Peak Road, Rolling Hills Estates. Admission is $15 for adults, $10 for senior citizens and $5 for children under 12.

In another special event, 25 teen-agers from the South Bay Jewish Community Center will perform an original comedy--”Westward Chai”--about the trials and tribulations of a bar mitzvah, the coming of age ceremony for young Jewish men. It will be at Torrance High School, 2200 W. Carson St., on March 3 at 8 p.m. and March 4 at 7 p.m. The cost is $6 for adults, $4 for seniors and children under 12.

Events this week are:

* Today, 1:30 to 3:30 p.m., craft workshops for ages 7 and older; art center ceramics studio.

* Monday, 8 p.m., photographer Aron’s slide lecture, Ner Tamid.

* Tuesday, 7:30 p.m., lecture and screening of the 1927 film, “The Jazz Singer,” as a glimpse at the American Jewish immigrant experience, at the art center’s Norris Gallery.