Golems Appearing Around the Country!

 

Glad to share the news that my Paper Golems are doing a bit of traveling, after their big reveal in Los Angeles earlier this year. You can now buy the Paper Golems poster on my shop site, featuring 20 of my favorites – but yes, you can also see them LIVE and in person at two locations, in Michigan and Pennsylvania.

Michigan friends can see them on exhibition at the Goodman Museum at Temple Israel, where DOZENS AND DOZENS of golems have taken over the gallery space! About a year ago I participated in their "Museum Moments" video series, and now — finally! — we've got an in-person show.

The Goodman Family Judaic & Archival Museum is thrilled to feature comic book, papercut artist Isaac Brynjegard-Bialik’s latest collection: Paper Golems. Inspired by the uncertainty of the pandemic, Brynjegard-Bialik connects popular culture with sacred texts and traditions to create golems that tell stories of power and protection. The golems allow us the opportunity to consider what is necessary to assume responsibility for one's protection and the community's protection, using whatever resources are available- be it mud or paper- and to consider what role we play in our own salvation or destruction.

 

Pennsylvania folks? You can see some of the series as part of "Roots & Blossoms: An Exhibit of Eastern European Papercut Art," now showing at the Guild of American Papercutters National Museum in Somerset, PA. Open through July 15, 2023; Monday through Thursday from 11 to 6, and Saturday from 10 to 2. Free and open to the public.

Come see this special exhibit at the Guild of American Papercutters National Museum featuring artists working in traditional and new Eastern European papercutting traditions of many kinds. Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Russia, and more are represented. This exhibit consists of art that is in the style of or influenced by papercutting traditions from the European countries of Poland and further east. From the colorful, stylized Wycinanki to cuts born from the Jewish Diaspora, Roots and Blossoms displays traditional, modern, and even fusion works of art from members of the Guild of American Papercutters. Come find out about the images and techniques of eastern European paper artists.

Paper Golems Are Coming to Los Angeles in January 2022!

 

The golem story is one of power and protection. When the pandemic began and the world seemed to unravel in so many different ways, I wanted to regain a sense of control over my life, and so I started making golems. And now, for the first time ever, you can see all 72 of my paper golems in a new exhibition at the Dortort Center for Creativity in the Arts at UCLA Hillel.

If you've been keeping up with me through the pandemic, you know how personal this series is. Every golem is a response to what I saw happening in the world, day after day and week after week. The series is, at its heart, a pandemic diary.

“Paper Golems: A Pandemic Diary” is on display at the Dortort Center for the Arts Gallery at UCLA Hillel from January 27 through March 11, 2022. The free opening night reception is Tuesday, March 1, from 7-9 pm — with exclusive posters for sale, freebies like stickers and buttons, and some big surprises!

Paper Golems in Jerusalem

Join me for a very special exhibition premiering DOZENS of my Paper Golems – THIS MONTH IN JERUSALEM! I’ll be exhibiting prints of some of my favorite golems in the MASSIVE series I have been creating since the pandemic hit in 2020, and talking about WHY GOLEMS and WHY NOW and WHY COMICS.

Jewish writers and artists have explored the golem narrative for centuries: using Jewish magic to bring clay figures to life, to do everything from performing household chores to protecting communities from existential danger. When the pandemic hit in 2020, I began to create golems in my home studio: pieced together from cut-up comic books, featuring brilliant colors and surprising juxtapositions. These golems are inspired by personal stories of universal interest, imbued with the attributes of classic super heroes in a decidedly contemporary context.
 
Exhibit opening and meet-and-greet on Saturday night, June 26, at 9 pm (after Shabbat) at Kol Haot in Jerusalem: Studio 9 in Hutsot Hayotser Artists’ Colony, across from Jaffa Gate.

Cutting up in New Jersey

 What a lovely story in The Jewish Standard about the work that Rabbi Shawna and I are doing as Paper Midrash – and in particular the work we're doing with Temple Emeth in New Jersey.

 

Gotham Golem

For some reason, though Batman is one of my favorite comic book characters, he doesn't wind up in many of my papercuts. That changes with this piece from my golem series. With a working title of "Gotham Golem," it measures 24" x 36" and it's made of cut-up Batman comics, focused in particular on Gotham City.

 

For me, the golem story is about protection and power. It's about making your own protector from whatever you have at hand, and hoping it doesn't grow beyond your control.

 The golem story is tied very closely to a sense of place – it's important where the material from which the golem is made comes from. As Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel took mud from the Vltava River in Prague to make his golem (spoiler alert: not a true story), the comics in my golem come from my childhood collection, and this golem is made of the city it is protecting.

 I can't wait to put this – and all of its companions – into an exhibition for you to see in person.

Inauguration Golem

Haven't posted as much over the past year — but I sure have been cutting paper here in my studio, and I want to share a new piece with you. It's another in my series of golem that I started in March, 2020, when the pandemic lockdowns began here in the U.S. – and this one is inspired by the events of January 20, 2021: the inauguration of a new American president and vice-president.

My new inauguration golem, as of yet untitled, in my studio.

It's a big one, measuring 24" x 36" (as many of my latest golems are) and it's another strong humanoid figure, facing front and ready for action. It's made with cut-up comics featuring super heroes that are women, immigrants, and people of color (all three or some combination of those qualities): Ms. Marvel (Kamala Khan), Sif, Thunder (Anissa Pierce), Vixen (Mari McCabe), and Supergirl.

There's a sense of dispensing with the nonsense of the last administration, and of celebration. There's strength and resolve. And there's power.

Detail with comic featuring Thunder (Anissa Pierce – daughter of Black Lightning).

The colors are drawing from one of my favorite moments of the day: national youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman reading her inspiring words from the steps of the Capitol where only two weeks before there was an armed insurrection and failed coup by white supremacists and their allies against the United States.

Detail with comics featuring Vixen (Mari McCabe).

And at the end of the ceremony, the sense that we were ready to pick ourselves up and strive to be the more perfect union that our founders envisioned, and that our present leaders reflected upon in their words.

America at its best. Courage. Heroism. Everyone pulling together.

So yeah, feeling a bit hopeful right now.

"Graphic Jews" and ish Festival

 Had a great time presenting for the third and final installment of the "Graphic Jews" webinar series from ish Festival, HUC Cincinnati, and the Skirball Museum in Cincinnati. If you missed it and you want to catch it on the replay, click here. Meantime, here are some screencaps; we talked about Jewish art, and golems, and comics – some of my favorite topics!

Sharing my "Twelve Tribes" series

Discussing "Wisdom Cries Out in the Streets"

Sharing some of my lockdown golems

"Emet" (truth) powers the traditional golem

My first golem is made of comics featuring Jewish super hero The Thing

Did a live demo!

Me, ish's Marie Krulewitch-Browne (right), and the Skirball's Abby Schwartz (below)

Studio Stories – Kol Haot

  

​As the global health pandemic continues to change artists’ lives and practice, Chicago-based artist Lilach Schrag is sharing stories of how artists have adapted to lockdown and the new reality, in a series called “Studio Stories 2020,” hosted by Kol HaOt. This week they profiled my work during lockdown, including my golem series and how Rabbi Shawna and I have been trying to keep Paper Midrash going. Check it out!

Arts, Provocation, and Jewish History

 Click here to listen as Aaron Henne and I discuss art, justice, comics, representation, and Judaism – and get a look at some new golems in my studio!

 

Join me this Sunday for "Sacred Words, Sacred Texts" opening reception

Please join me this Sunday afternoon in Los Angeles from two to five p.m. for the opening reception of “Sacred Words, Sacred Texts” – an exhibition in collaboration with American Jewish University,
USC Hillel and Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion/LA.

It's a group show featuring artists from around the world, and I am pleased to have 12 papercuts included, many on loan from local collectors.

The reception starts at 2 pm at Hebrew Union College (3077 University Avenue, Los Angeles – 213 749 3424) and at some point wanders down to the USC site for dessert.

For details, visit the Facebook invitation page – and please "like" my fan page to get regular updates in your Facebook feed.

The exhibition runs through mid-December 2013.

"Sacred Words, Sacred Texts" features twelve B2 papercuts; please join me at the reception.

Please join me in Los Angeles on Sunday, October 13, from two to five pm, for the opening reception of “Sacred Words, Sacred Texts” – an exhibition in collaboration with American Jewish University,
USC Hillel and Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion/LA.

I am pleased to have 12 papercuts included in this exciting exhibition, many on loan from local collectors.

The reception starts at 2 pm at Hebrew Union College (3077 University Avenue, Los Angeles – 213 749 3424) and at some point wanders down to the USC site for dessert.

For details, visit the Facebook invitation page – and please "like" my fan page to get regular updates in your Facebook feed.

The exhibition runs through mid-December 2013.

The secret of "The Golem"

Here's how to spot the "secret" Hebrew letters in my papercut, "The Golem" (if you've come here by QR code, welcome aboard!):

See it live at "You did WHAT to my comics?!?" (details here).
A color catalog of all works on display is available for download as a PDF here.

Photos from the PJCC gallery tour

My thanks and appreciation go out to everyone who joined me for the gallery tour yesterday at the Peninsula Jewish Community Center.

I had a wonderful time talking with you about art and Judaism, and I'm especially pleased I got to meet those of you who have been purchasing work from the show. I signed some prints and waved my hands around, talked with old friends and made some new ones.

There are still works available for purchase; check out the catalog here to see everything in the show, alongside descriptions of each piece and listings of the comics I cut up to make them – and contact me if you're interested in acquiring a piece.

"The Golem" now showing in Foster City

"The Golem" (18" x 24", mixed media) is now showing at the Peninsula JCC in Foster City, California – it's one of my many new works in the show, which will be open from January 4 through March 19, 2013.

Legend tells us that in times of danger there are those in the Jewish shtetls and villages who have brought life to animate matter, creating golems to protect the populace. The golem is given life with the inscription of the Hebrew word “emet” (“truth”) across its forehead; when its task is done the aleph is erased, leaving only “met” (“death”). Tony Stark created the Iron Man armor to protect those who can not protect themselves, hence the form of the golem’s head in this papercut, backed with cut-up comics featuring clay and mud, and watercolors by the artist to imbue the piece with a handmade element to mirror the creation of the golem.

At the top are the three Hebrew letters which make the word “emet,” obscured through overlapping to maintain the secret of the golem’s power; the letters are backed with cut-up Iron Man comics.

For details on the show – and on the reception on Sunday, February 10, at which I'll be giving a talk and leading a tour of the gallery – visit the PJCC website.

A big color catalog of all works on display is available for download as a PDF here.