Jonathan Bernbaum, ‘fearless’ video artist, among Oakland fire victims

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Jonathan Bernbaum wanted to blow people’s minds.

Whether he was performing as a VJ at a club — creating a visual experience mixing lights, colors and images — or debating his friends, the 34-year-old Berkeley native and Oakland resident who died in Friday night’s catastrophic warehouse fire in the Fruitvale District didn’t care for understatement.

A 2004 graduate of Brandeis University in Massachusetts and 2008 graduate of the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts, Bernbaum went on to be an intern at Pixar Animation Studios before focusing fully on his VJ work, most recently doing shows for the Australian electronic duo Knife Party and traveling around the world on tours with various groups.

“He liked being the oddball — doing foreign accents, staring contests — he’d take people out of their comfort zone,” said a friend from Brandeis, Storey Clayton, who was on the same debate team as Bernbaum. “And I think he developed that into his craft.”

Bernbaum didn’t need to be in a tournament to put on a lively debate with friends, Clayton said.

“Unlike most people, he didn’t need to adapt or put on a persona,” Clayton said. “He was sort of in full-throttle debate mode all the time.”

As a VJ, said friend and fellow Oakland Katabatik collective member Jay Fields, Bernbaum “created alternate realities.”

“Someone who may only listen to mainstream music could take in his work and walk away devastated, stunned,” Fields said. “It’d make them inspired and see things differently.”

As faculty advisor for the Berkeley High School Jacket, Rick Ayers saw the roots of Bernbaum’s passion in his three years on the newspaper before he graduated in 2000.

“Jonathan was an ace reporter,” said Ayers. “Super passionate. Obsessed with getting scoops and a good story. He was driven.”

Ayers, a University of San Francisco education professor and the author of “An Empty Seat in Class: Teaching and Learning after the Death of a Student,” believed Bernbaum would become a journalist or an academic, especially after he joined the debate team at Brandeis.

Instead, Bernbaum turned to art and found his community.

“One of the most kickass people I know has left this life for the next,” wrote a high school friend, Rena, in a Facebook tribute.

“Jon died doing what he loved,” she wrote. “Making his art and bringing joy and smiles to people who needed exactly that. My heart aches that he is gone but I am so happy that his last moments were spent performing his art. An art he was respected for and flown all over the world to perform.”

Nabila Lester was one of his dearest friends. They were classmates at Berkeley High, and again at the University of Southern California’s film production program.

“I have to learn how to function without him,” said Lester.

A filmmaker, she travels the world for work, as Bernbaum did. But they always stayed connected. Last month, they rendezvoused in Berkeley for Indian food, then worked it off by running around their old high school track at midnight.

“He just was an absolutely fearless human being,” she said. “Committed to his art and sharing it with people.”

Kimberly Veklerov and Nanette Asimov are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email: kveklerov@sfchronicle.com, nasimov@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @NanetteAsimov @kveklerov