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From the train at Hollands Spoor, they always attract your attention: the big doll and the steam locomotive with the zeppelin. They are painted on the end walls of two elongated blocks of small houses in light pink brick with red tiled roofs. The first stone for these very simple workers' houses was laid in 1874. This is how the Red Village came into being at Hollands Spoor station.

Because Het Dorp was completely dilapidated, it was thoroughly renovated in the 1980s. At that time, the well-known painter and graphic artist Hermanus Berserik from The Hague was commissioned to paint four murals to embellish it. Berserik, or Bers for friends, grew up in the Stationsbuurt and drew on his own childhood memories for the pictures. He painted, for instance, a large puppet releasing a bird with old and new houses on the left, a steam locomotive with a zeppelin above it that had once made a deep impression on little Bers, a liquorice bottle with a butcher's boy on a bicycle, and a puppet show with Jan Klaasen and Katrijn. One on each end of the two blocks of houses. His son Teun and daughter Françoise helped him execute this large-scale work. When housing association Staedion decided to renovate Het Rode Dorp in 2010, Berserik's children restored two panels: the doll and the locomotive. They have been hanging there again since 2014.

Berserik enjoyed great fame outside the museum circuit with his realistic scenes and slightly alienating effect. Private individuals in particular bought his paintings, which bear witness to nostalgia and a penchant for theatre. In addition, he also produced many commissioned works (PTT, KLM, Salamanderpockets, theatre decors and costumes). His art had no deeper meaning. In his own words, he was looking for peace, balance and a bit of poetry. That poetry can also be seen in 'The Doll' and 'The Train' in The Red Village. Just a bit too big to be true.