Andi Arnovitz and Joyce Ellen Weinstein: Contemporary Artists Re-Animating Jewish Texts and Traditions

I have noticed a fascinating trend of contemporary Jewish artists turning to little known Jewish traditions and texts from the past and re-animating them in their art, giving them new life, new forms and new meanings.

Israeli-American artist Andi Arnovitz is creating a haunting and provocative series about forgotten women communal leaders, continuing to make powerful Jewish feminist art (see here for my piece on her wedding dress, What We Bring, now at the Jewish Museum).

For this new project, she first made eight small books about important and forgotten Jewish Ashkenazi women leaders in the shtetl communities, such as one book on the klogerins, the paid professional Jewish women mourners who wailed on behalf of the dead and suffering in a community. She then made textile collars for each type of shtetl women leader. Here is a photo of the collar-in-progress for the professional mourners, with hand-blown glass tears.

Then Arnovitz started creating multi-media collages using watercolor and bits from old Talmuds and tetrapak etchings, a work-in-progress.

In this beautiful, evocative collage she depicts the “Tukerins,” the women Mikveh attendants in the shtetl. As she writes, “These women knew who was having fertility issues, who was suffering from domestic abuse, who was sick and who was healing. They held collective and communal secrets.” The loose threads remind me of hairs, of the body.

Here is her collage about “Feldmesterins,” the “grave measurers” village families hired to measure their ancestors’ graves and make Shabbat candlesticks from the measuring string.

And here is her collage about the Klogerin, the professional women mourners:

Another artist turning to the Jewish past for inspiration is Joyce Ellen Weinstein, 86 years old, a former New Yorker who now lives in Maine. Like Arnovitz, Weinstein experiments with many different media and techniques in her art. For a new exhibition which opened August 7 at the Maine Museum of Photographic Arts, “Investigations into the Metaphysical,” she was inspired by Babylonian incantation bowls to create bowls inscribed with proverbs from the Talmud. These bowls have a confounding delicacy and organic power that reminds me of the fragile yet strong women in Arnovitz’s collages. The loose threads in one, “A Lie Is Not A Leg To Stand On,” reminds me of a bird’s nest and also the loose threads in Arnovitz’ collages.

Here are some photos of the bowls:

“Do Not Look At the Container But What Is Inside It”. Photo from artist.

Close-up of “Do Not Look At the Container But What’s Inside It.”

“The Sun Will Set Without One’s Assistance.” First image is of the bowl, second is a close-up. Photos from the artist.

“Wherever You Go, There You Are.” Photo from artist.

“A Lie Is Not A Leg To Stand On.” Photo from artist. Here the loose strands remind me of a bird’s nest and also of the loose threads in Andi Arnovitz’ collages.

“If I Am Not For Myself, Who Will Be For Me.” Photos by artist.

Close-up of “If I Am Not For Myself, Who Will Be For Me.” Photo by artist.

Weinstein wrote in an email to me, “The original Babylonian magic bowls date from the 5^th to the 8^th century CE and were inscribed with spells to ward off demons, some even had eggshells embedded in the clay. My bowls are made with paper mache, eggshells in some, wood, photography and other contemporary materials. The inscriptions in each bowl are borrowed from the Talmud, proverbs that have lived on through the ages and have become part of everyday Western European thought. It is my contention that in our world today, we need all the help we can get.”

Both artists are looking back to past Jewish tradition and texts to re-imagine them and give them new life, creating moving, profound art that now becomes part of our shared Jewish heritage.