Paper Midrash – Thanks for a great 2018!

It's been a wonderful year; we are so honored to have been able to bring Paper Midrash to so many wonderful communities in 2018. We've got a bunch of bookings for the first half of 2019 already; if you're interested in bringing us to YOU in 2019-2020, drop us a line!

All Hands on Deck: Fingerprint Mosaics at Camp Newman

You may have already read the whole story – how this summer at URJ Camp Newman my wife (Rabbi Shawna B2) and I led campers in the creation of new tallitot (prayer shawls) for the camp, one session at a time.

Each tallit is a fingerprint mosaic, where each camper had a chance to add their personal mark. The idea was that fingerprints are personal, but combined together they create a mosaic-like pattern, creating a communal work rather than an individual one — and that it would take the fingerprints of the whole eidah (session) to create a finished work. (And a big thank-you to Rabbi Laura Novak Winer, who worked with us on all of these talliot!)

If you haven't read that post, please go check it out on the camp blog: https://campnewman.org/2018/07/06/all-hands-on-deck-fingerprint-mosaics-at-camp-newman/. But here's something the post  doesn't have: pictures of all of the finished tallitot, which we're pleased to share here.

Avodah is dedicated to community involvement and social justice,
so their tallit is a rainbow flag they took to the 2018 Pride Festival

Tzofim's tallit is a Jerusalem skyline, complete with turrets and archways.

Rishonim is out "nature" session, so they made a tree – with a branch for each of their twelve "tribes."

Bogrim made the seven species: grapes, dates, wheat, barley, figs, olives, and pomegranates.

The CITs are celebrating "C-CHAI-T" this year so their handprints surround a chai, with advisors' hands blessing them from the sides. (This shot is the ALMOST-done tallit; we were waiting for two late arrivals to complete it.)

Hagigah's tallit is an abstract representation of waves,
in honor of Camp Newman's first summer "by the bay."

Faculty and staff made a tallit as well – "Miriam's Well," with a quote from Amos 5:24:
"Let justice roll down like water, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream."

And if you want more information on what we can do with your community, check us out on the web at www.PaperMidrash.com.

My heart is with Camp Newman.

This week we had some very sad news – our beloved Camp Newman was destroyed by wildfires... and yet, we will rebuild, somehow. We are #newmanstrong. As the camp website puts it, "Camp Newman is more than just buildings. It is a community built on the memories of 70 glorious summers." With that in mind I wanted to share a few photos from my 11 summers at Camp Newman – some of the work made by campers in my Hagigah papercutting and mosaic workshops over the years.

One of my first mural projects at Camp Newman was in 2009
with a bunch of staff kids, while we struggled with the "Swine '09" debacle.
(Yes, that's a thermometer in the pig's mouth.)

Rabbi Shawna Brynjegard-Bialik (my wife) and I working on a live painting
to accompany a story from Rabbi Paul Kipnes.

2010 camper work

A group "shin" project for workshop students in 2011,
which we gave to the camp as a gift.

Working with campers in 2012

For "Faculty Art Night" in 2012 we made papercut mezuzot for the camp.

Detail from 2012 "Faculty Art Night" mezuzah.

2013 camper work

2013 camper workshop group project: "Kehillah Kedoshah" (Holy Community)

Sometimes we'd make a little guerila stencil art for camp...

2014 "Ma Tovu" mosaic made by Hagigah campers for one of the new cabins

2015 campers hard at work in the Hagigah Building

2015 camper work

2015 camper work

In 2016 campers made a "Miriam's Well" mosaic –
and we had a faculty mosaic night to share the fun!

2016 camper work

The finished "Miriam's Well" mosaic in place around a water bottle refilling station.

2017 camper work

2017 camper work

The 2017 Hagigah campers made a "Tallit Blessing" mosaic for the new cabins

At work with campers in 2017

For the 2017 "70th Anniversary Celebration" we made a mosaic featuring the 70th logo.

URJ President Rabbi Rick Jacobs (center) and Rabbi Shawna B2 (right)
working together on the anniversary mosaic.

You can help rebuild Camp Newman – visit campnewman.org/support-newman/newmanstrong to contribute to #newmanstrong!

Rhea Carmi's "Humanity's Struggles"

My opening is next Thursday, January 16, at the Dortort Gallery (at the UCLA Hillel) in Los Angeles from 7 to 9 pm; I'd love to see you there. There are actually three artists opening new shows at the  Hillel that night, which means LOTS of great art for you to enjoy.

Rhea Carmi is one of them. Her work "celebrates with antiquity the everlasting human spirit, which survives the brutality, and insanity of war, aridity and harshness of human nature as it endures." Her series called "Humanity's Struggles" is very strong, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it – here are some detail shots I took when I stopped by last week for a sneak preview.

The opening night reception is free to the public — join me on Thursday, January 16, 2014, from 7-9 pm at the Dortort Gallery at UCLA Hillel in Los Angeles: 574 Hilgard Avenue; LA, CA 90024. Parking is available across the street at on-campus meters; call 310-208-3081 for more information. The show is open through March 14.

Super Heroes, Holy Land: Thickets

Above on the left is my new papercut about the binding of Isaac, called "The Thicket." On the right is a piece by Avner Moriah on the same subject. Both are at the UCLA Hillel building right now – and you can see them and much more on Thursday, January 16.

My new show is called "Super Heroes, Holy Land" and is inspired by my family trip to Israel this past summer. It's all new work, and it's all stunning – and some of the largest work I've yet made.

The opening night reception is Thursday, January 16, from 7 to 9 pm, and it's free to the public. Plus, it's also the opening night for Avner Moriah and Rhea Carmi, who have work in other locations in the Hillel building.

Please join me at the Dortort Gallery at UCLA Hillel in Los Angeles: 574 Hilgard Avenue; LA, CA 90024. Parking is available across the street at on-campus meters; call 310-208-3081 for more information. The show is open through March 14.

Steve Wolkoff and "the power of repitition"

This week I got to meet Steve Wolkoff, a local artist whose current work includes self-described "word piles" which he says are a response to Anish Kapoor’s “1,000 Names.” I *love* that these works are made of paint, and therefore still "paintings."

Above you can see him with a piece about the Torah's 613 mitzvot (plural of mitzvah; in English, commandments) that will be in an upcoming group show in Los Angeles. He told me about the significance of the white and the blue in this, his first non-monotone pile. The 248 white mitzvot represent the "positive" commandments, the number of bones and main organs in the human body (per the Talmud); the 365 blue represent the "negative" commandments, one for each day in the solar year. So, yeah – he wrote/painted the word mitzvah 613 times and built a pile out of them.

You can check out more of his work on his website – I suggest you start with his piece titled, "the names of all my facebook friends," which I find presents an interesting commentary on our contemporary obsession with social networks. He writes:

I recreated the facebook experience in paint. I wrote the names of all my facebook friends in “facebook-blue” acrylic squiggles. Like facebook, some friends’ names are fully visible; others are partially obscured; most are lost within the mass of other friends – they are there, but you will never see them on your wall.

Hear, O Israel

Here's a smaller, simpler piece I made as part of an initial foray into a prayer/creation series. It's the first word of the Shema, and the first day of creation... called, "Shema." (Pardon the quickie low-res photo.)