Archive for January, 2008
“A Jewish Artist, Whether You Like It or Not”
January 30th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
My article about Miriam Beerman’s work is in this week’s Jewish Press. I address to what extent Beerman should be considered a Jewish artist, with an interview with the artist, and several critics and historians.
Israel (Re)Invites Beatles, Doesn’t Apologize
January 30th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
The title says it all, from CNN. Apparently Israel felt the band would corrupt its citizens in 1965 when it uninvited the Beatles, but now the remaining band members would be kosher to come play at its 60th b-day bash. John Lennon and George Harrison must have been the corrupting ones…
Matthew Collings Bashes ‘Street Art’
January 29th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Matthew Collings writes a hilarious roasting of ‘Street art,’ which he recommends for folks who “find Cézanne a bit overrated,” in ‘Banksy’s ideas have the value of a joke’ in The Times, UK.
(Image: SOFIA Virtual Tour. Streets are not art, according to Collings.)
Money quote on Gareth Williams, “the urban-art specialist at Bonhams,” who says, “By transposing their images from street wall to canvas, urban artists are now creating a permanent legacy without compromising the vitality of their art.” Quoth Collings: “Poor Williams – how giddy and weightless life must be for him, to be in the business of using words without having any interest in what they mean.”
There is also an Islamic art reference, so this isn’t entirely off topic. (HT: Michael Dubitzky)
Sink or Float?
January 29th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Photo: Reuters. A Holocaust float at a Rio de Janeiro carnival. Some groups are outraged, but Paulo Barros, artistic director of the Viradouro school which is responsible for the piece, says, “The float is extremely respectful, it’s a warning, it’s something shocking that we don’t want to happen ever again.” Floats often have dancers, as he clarified, “If we had people dancing on top of dead bodies that would indeed be disrespectful.”
And the clincher from the end of the Reuters story:
Traditionally, the use of religious references causes last-minute problems for samba schools. In the past, the Roman Catholic Church has barred floats with figures of Christ and the Virgin Mary and samba schools had to cover or modify them.
A Robotic Biblical Scribe, Losing Iraqi Art
January 29th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
RIP: Miles Lerman, 88
January 24th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Miles Lerman, a founder of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, has died at 88.
The Museum released the information here. See also the NY Times, Washington Post, American Jewish Committee, JTA, Forward, and NY Jewish Week.
See also the The Miles Lerman Center for the Study of Jewish Resistance.
Lerman had told the Philadelphia Inquirer of fighting the Nazis with other resistance fighters: “Our job was to raise havoc, to raise hell with them and survive.” (Photo: Arnold Kramer/Associated Press)
“Post-Jewish Painting And Its Discontents”
January 23rd, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Lilah Freedland’s “dream as though you’ll live forever, live as though you’ll die today” (2003), from my review in The Jewish Press of Spertus’ new show “The New Authentics: Artists of the Post-Jewish Generation.”
Here’s the gist:
The artists of “The New Authentics” ought not to be dismissed as lesser Jews who have turned their backs on the tradition. They should not be criticized for not painting in a sufficiently Jewish manner. They should perhaps even be congratulated for their courage in introducing so much Jewish content and as many ideas as they have, for that is often aesthetic suicide in the gallery and museum world.
But where the lot should be taken to task is where they turn their eyes on the Orthodox community. If they were truly postmodern Jewish artists, they would not fetishize and misrepresent the Orthodox community and seek out examples they see as breaking the Orthodox stereotype. When these artists resist being stereotyped, they should extend the same favor to their Jewish subjects, even if they do wear tzitzit and side curls.
LGF: Netherlands Anne Frank-Kaffiyeh Design
January 23rd, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
“Sick, sick, sick,” writes Little Green Footballs of the design below by Boomerang, “a popular Dutch merchant of T-shirts, greeting cards, and other items.” LGF already has 250 comments…
Dallas’ African Art Museum Chief Curator Resigns, When is a Jug an Islamic Jug?
January 22nd, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
An Octogenarian Still Paints Religiously
January 20th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Chuck Holub, 88, who says of his religious works, “I’ve given them away to people at Wal-Mart … That’s my mission. I’m spreading God’s word through drawing pictures and giving them away.”
He adds, “Have I heard the Lord talking in his voice? Yes I have, … Other Christians will tell you no, you can’t, but I have.” Article: The Leaf-Chronicle.
Islamic Art Enjoys a “Record Year,” Worshipping Strokes
January 20th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Two Links for WJW Story
January 20th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
My Washington Jewish Week story received two links:
- 2. Imam Johari Abdul-Malik’s blog
New Mexico Acquires $3m worth of Devotional Art, a 4-ton Buddha Returns
January 18th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Belarus Editor Jailed for Muhammad Cartoons
January 18th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Alexander Sdvizhkov will spend three years in jail for reproducing the infamous Muhammad cartoons, Al Jazeera reports. “May God and the holy cross be with us,” said Sdvizhkov, who is evidently Christian.
New online Islamic Egyptian art and culture journal
January 17th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
From flickr:
The Centre for Egyptological Studies, Moscow (CESRAS), and the Russian Institute of Egyptology in Cairo (RIEC) of the Russian Academy of Sciences is initiating a new Internet-project at www.islamic-egypt.org. This is to be an illustrated online journal on Islamic Egyptian art and culture. We are not experts on these subjects, but wish to provide a platform for those who wish to contribute to the understanding of Islamic culture in Egypt. We have as yet almost nothing on the site, but hope that the project will stimulate interest in building a strong web-presence at a time when the Islamic world is seriously misunderstood.
More after the jump, for those who are interested… Continue reading ‘New online Islamic Egyptian art and culture journal’
A Newly Unearthed 2,500-Year-Old (Idolatrous!) Israeli Seal
January 17th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Israeli archaeologists, led by Dr. Eilat Mazar, have found a 2,500-year-old black stone seal, with the name “Temech” on it, “amid stratified debris in the excavation under way just outside the Old City walls near the Dung Gate.” The Jerusalem Post explains:
According to the Book of Nehemiah, the Temech family were servants of the First Temple and were sent into exile to Babylon following its destruction by the Babylonians in 586 BCE … The 2.1 x 1.8-cm. elliptical seal is engraved with two bearded priests standing on either side of an incense altar with their hands raised forward in a position of worship. A crescent moon, the symbol of the chief Babylonian god Sin, appears on the top of the altar.
Click below to read two important quotes: Continue reading ‘A Newly Unearthed 2,500-Year-Old (Idolatrous!) Israeli Seal’
Islamic Art from flickr
January 17th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
From flickr:
Muhammad Adnan Asim (linkadnan) Fine Art ( Islamic Art In Geometrical Shapes ) Exhibition At North City School Of Art, Karachi ; Sunday, 15 November 1998
—————————- If You Wish To Know More About Adnan Asim, E - Mail Me At linkadnan@email.com OR Visit My Web Site = linkadnan.bravehost.com
Spinoza the Absurd, Muslim Hip-Hop’s Victims
January 17th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
“A rabbi and an imam walked into a coffee shop …”
January 17th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
My article on Rabbi Brad Hirschfield and Imam Johari Abdul-Malik, and their discussion at Busboys & Poets promoting Hirschfield’s new book “You Don’t Have to Be Wrong for Me to Be Right: Finding Faith Without Fanaticism,” is in this week’s Washington Jewish Week. The (somewhat blurry) photo is mine. If I can find out how to get my recorded interviews from iTunes onto this blog, I will post those as well…
Church of Scientology vs. Gawker, Painting Prayers
January 16th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Continue reading ‘Church of Scientology vs. Gawker, Painting Prayers’
Afghan Culture Ministry Bans “Kite Runner”
January 16th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Kite Runner (which isn’t anti-Islam) has been banned in Afghanistan. Why the ban? “Some of the film’s scenes will arouse sensitivity among some of our people.” [NY Times]
Tate Modern Shies Away from Islam, Iran Evaluates Monotheistic Art
January 15th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Barenboim Now a Palestinian Citizen
January 15th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
From AFP, via NY Times: Daniel Barenboim is now a Palestinian citizen, and says he hopes his “new status will be an example of Israeli-Palestinian coexistence.”
Islamic Jesus, Playing Spinoza
January 14th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Interview: Andrea Useem, religionwriter.com
January 14th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
According to her bio on religionwriter.com, Andrea Useem is a writer, editor and web producer for many venues, including: the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, Knowledge@Wharton and Religion News Service. She is based in Reston, Va., and holds a Master’s of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School. She lived in Nairobi, Kenya, for 4 years, freelancing as for the Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle and Chronicle of Higher Education. Andrea replied to several questions via email, with the caveat that she is “completely flat-footed when it comes to art.”
MW: I see from your bio that you are interested in Quakerism. Have you had a chance to see Rowena Loverance’s new book “Christian Art” [which I covered here]? If so, what do you think about her focus on religious Quaker art?
AU: While spending three months in 1995 at Woodbrooke, the Quaker Study Center in Birmingham, England, I was extremely lucky to take an art course called Appleseed with Brenda Clifft Healy and Chris Cook. They used a Quaker spiritual approach, focusing on our individual experience of the divine—in Quakerism, of course, there is no priesthood, and each believer must experience God for themselves. With Chris and Brenda we responded to other art works — even a Shakespeare play at one point — through art. I remember one assignment of painting with our eyes closed. It was enormously fun. Woodbrooke has a fully stocked art room that’s open 24 hours a day, so I would sometimes run over there early in the morning to paint. I never had any talent at painting or drawing or creating art, so I abandoned it in favor of what I was good at (writing). But with Chris and Brenda, I discovered the obvious: that you don’t have to be good at something to enjoy it.
As to the book you mentioned, no I haven’t seen that. I should confess that, as a journalist, I rarely — okay, never — write about visual arts or other high art. The closest I come is reviewing books of fiction, and even that is a stretch for me. When I read poems I skim through for the main points. I think I’m like a lot of journalists in this way: I have, essentially, a non-fiction mind.
Once while I was traveling back and forth between the U.S. and East Africa, where I worked as a journalist for several years, I spent a few hours of my lay-over at the Tate Gallery in London and saw a painting by Alan Reynolds. On the placard beside it, art critic Robert Melville wrote that the painting captured the tension in human nature “between dread of confinement and fear of the void.” I think that one line almost completely defines our psychology as humans: that oscillation between safety and risk. It also says everything about me as an art-appreciator that I wrote down and remembered the quote, but don’t remember the painting.
MW: Do you think journalists are often closed to art and all things artsy? I know journalism is often based on the premise that stories should be made to fit into organized words with a lede and short, concise graphs, and art often resists that sort of form. Do you see that as a limitation of journalism that it might be ill-equipped for reporting on art? Do you think it would better serve artists to communicate in a better and less esoteric way?
AU: I can only speak for myself, but I do tend to view the world through a journalistic prism. I simply can’t imagine writing a news story about a piece of real art. That would be an art form in itself, one I’m not trained for. I think about James Agee’s description of a piece of music in Now Let Us Praise Famous Men — he was a journalist, and he managed to capture something essential about music performance using words. But of course in Famous Men he really pushed the envelope of journalistic style, further than most of us can go in the average article or posting.
Continue reading ‘Interview: Andrea Useem, religionwriter.com’
Stolen Icons, an Aroused Jesus Sculpture
January 11th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Deities with Weapons, a Soot Stained Church
January 9th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Continue reading ‘Deities with Weapons, a Soot Stained Church’
Afghani Remnants, 2 Kitaj Shows, Aesthetic Peace Plan for the Middle East
January 9th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Continue reading ‘Afghani Remnants, 2 Kitaj Shows, Aesthetic Peace Plan for the Middle East’
The Santa-Obsessed Painter
January 8th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
Bill Keen, in an effort to create “art that is something” rather than “about something,” has been painting Santa since 1974. The works, which he has refused to sell to calendar-makers, reflect the events of the year, such as the 9/11 Santa with eyes that are “kind of teary … like they might have been in the dust, the smoke” and an African American Santa, based on a homeless man Keen saw. In the end, the works become a diary of people Keen has met, and some he’s lost. Indeed he himself looks like Santa. (HT: Michael Dubitzky)