Avivah Zornberg’s Intricate Patterns

Posted: Thu, 05/23/2013 - 11:30 | Posted by: Susan Reimer-Torn | Well Versed

Avivah Zornberg overlays a dizzying tapestry of midrashic, psychoanalytic and literary sources on her biblical themes. Her most satisfied listeners allow for the unmooring of the categorical mind. Zornberg, most recently the author of “The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the Biblical Unconscious,” suggests that the hidden meaning of our classical texts is best perceived with our own porous and poetic unconscious minds.

A Photographer With An Ironic Eye

Posted: Tue, 05/21/2013 - 11:10 | Posted by: Caroline Harris | Well Versed

Vivid purple, yellow and green feathers grow out of his face, peacock feathers crown his head, and green feathers wrap around his neck. A beard pokes through and a trenchcoat covers his body. An avian humanoid or a man in a Purim costume?

Jews And The Arts, Players And Pundits

Posted: Sun, 05/19/2013 - 17:44 | Posted by: Sharon Anstey | Well Versed

The Jewish Studies Center at Baruch College hosted an ambitious and absorbing program, “Jewish Arts and Identity in the Contemporary World” on May 7th. Three panels – on theater, music and the visual arts - were the core of the conference complemented by a performance by Audrey Flack and the Art History Band.

A Tribute to Rabbi Neil Gillman

Posted: Mon, 05/13/2013 - 11:53 | Posted by: Jeff Yablonka | Well Versed

“Faith lasts for a moment and then you’re back in the desert again,” said Rabbi Neil Gillman, quoting Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel.

For more than half a century. the former dean of the Rabbinical School and current Professor Emeritus of Jewish Philosophy at The Jewish Theological Seminary has guided students of all ages and Jews of all denominations through the shifting sand of that theological Sinai.

Two Israeli Painters To Watch

Posted: Fri, 05/10/2013 - 10:38 | Posted by: Jill Nathanson | Well Versed

This year’s MFA exhibition at The New York Studio School, which opened on Wednesday night, includes two Israeli painters working with specifically Jewish or Israeli themes. Leah Raab paints large-scale images of Jerusalem that are tender and intimate, but sometimes communicate a sense of foreboding. Shany Saar paints narrative works, often of biblical themes. Both create strong images through an inventive sense of form and color, vigorous brushwork and an achieved sense of pictorial space.