Costa Bernstein

Costa Bernstein was born in 1973 in Saint Petersburg

Costa Bernstein was born Konstantin Bernstein on August 5, 1973, in Leningrad, where he grew up. His father was a doctor and his mother a teacher. From 1988 to 1992 he studied at the Saint Petersburg College of Architecture and Construction.

He immigrated to Israel, settled in Haifa and became an Israeli citizen. From 1993 to 1997 he studied at the private art school of Y. Brilov in Haifa, and in 1999 he trained as a graphic designer. He then worked as an independent artist and private art teacher.

From 2000 to 2002 he did art work with children badly hurt in accidents and terror attacks at Loewenstein Rehabilitation Hospital in Raanana. In 2001 and 2002 he taught graphics and composition at the Max Stern Yezreel Valley College.

In 2002 he moved to Germany, working in Wuppertal as a book illustrator and art teacher, and in 2003 he founded an integrative art school there for German and immigrant children. In 2004 he moved to Frankfurt, where his studio is in the AtelierFrankfurt center. In 2007 he co-founded a project bringing Jewish people with mental and intellectual disabilities into Jewish communities through art.

In 2016 he and artist Viktor Naimark made a menorah for the Jewish prayer room at Frankfurt Airport, commissioned by the city's rabbinate. His works are held by Frankfurt's Römer city hall, the House of City History in Offenbach, GIZ and private collections in several countries.