Foto Friday – Winter Wildflower Wonderland
Filed under: education, Environment, Foto Friday, General, Holidays, Israeliness, Travel
I am not a great fan of rain and so this winter has been a particularly miserable one. Rain, rain, rain and more rain. However, even a sun worshiper such as myself can admit upside to the horrible, awful, gray, chilly, soggy, foggy, never-ending wet and damp: the landscape is green, the waterline at Lake Kinneret (the Sea of Galilee) has risen and the winter wildflowers are coming into full bloom.
This month, Israel’s nature-lovers will take their annual trek through field and forest in search of their favorite flowers. The Society for the Preservation of Nature (SPNI) is hosting a series of tours in celebration of the season and the upcoming Tu b’Shvat holiday. As always, they will seek out the shy and elusive Persian Cyclamen…
Photo by Sara Gold – Wildflowers of Israel
Fields dotted with blood red Crown Anemones are always a magnificent sight, but their light purple cousins are no less lovely…
Photo by Amikam Shoob – Wildflowers of Israel
The Common Narcissus, whose fragrance is nothing if not controversial…
Photo by Sara Gold – Wildflowers of Israel
The elegant and stately Wild Hyacinth…
Photo by Sara Gold – Wildflowers of Israel
And of course, Tu b’Shvat wouldn’t be complete without the blossoming almond tree!
Photo by Mike Livne – Wildflowers of Israel
Aspiring nature photographers take note: Wildflowers in Israel, in conjunction with Jerusalem Botanical Gardens and FujiFilm, is holding a photo contest and there are still a few days left before the deadline closes on February 8. Information and a list of subjects (in Hebrew) is available here or submissions can be emailed directly.
Foto Friday – Never Forget
Filed under: Art, design, education, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, News, Politics, War
Keeping The Memory Alive (Children in the Holocaust) is a poster contest being mounted across the world to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is today (Friday).
An international panel of distinguished judges, comprising experts in both design and in Holocaust Education, selected the 16 best posters from more than 300 submitted by design students from France, Israel and the Czech Republic. They were asked to present works on the theme of Holocaust commemoration, with an emphasis on the nature of memory and the plight of children.
The three finalists designed posters that stood out for their originality, beauty, and meaning.
The work by Veronica Novakova, a designer from the Czech Republic, portrays a well-known childhood punishment. “Traditionally, to correct a child’s errant behavior, an adult will force the ‘naughty’ child to write his misdeed over and over again, until he ‘learns his lesson.’ In this case, the misdeed is written by a child who is forced to denounce his friendship with a Jewish friend.
Designer Martina Cejpova also explores the effect the Nazi anti-Jewish policy had on children. “In her poster, she depicts a universally-recognized image from childhood: a hopscotch board, chalked onto the pavement. This particular game, however, is marred by a hateful symbol of discrimination drawn onto its cross-arms – the yellow star. Its inclusion here indicates that the insidious and pervasive hatred perpetrated by the adult world has also filtered down to the world of children, destroying their innocence.”
French designer Boris Grzeszcak deals with another theme in his work – the nature of memory. “His black-and-white poster presents a striking image of a scarred tree cut to expose the rings. A deep gash cuts to the very core of the trunk, where the word “emet” (truth) is written in tiny letters… [The artist says,] ‘The truth resides in the act of remembering and above all, never forgetting these dramatic events.’”
Peter Chmela of the Czech Republic says, “This poster wants to show the impotence of Jewish children against the Nazi soldiers. I tried to illustrate this theme with a big contrast between soldier and child.”
Yael Boverman, Israel: “The object that a survivor carries throughout a lifetime enables him or her to keep their memory alive. The closet symbolizes a collective closet, reflecting the repressed memories of the Jewish people as a whole. For every survivor, the memory is forever present under the thin veil of everyday functioning, represented by the new shirts, but at the bottom of the stack, there always lies the shirt kept from a different time – the persisting memory of a past that refuses to be abandoned.”
The project is funded by the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research (ITF), together with Yad Vashem, Israel; Mémorial de la Shoah, France; and the European Shoah Legacy Institute, Czech Republic; in cooperation with the Holocaust and the United Nations Outreach Programme.
In addition to the posters, there is also a lesson plan that provides tools to aid students and teachers in discussing the more universal aspects of memory — as well as the challenges facing those who use the visual arts to commemorate the Holocaust today.
Foto Friday – Retrospective for fashion-forward Mula Eshet
Filed under: Art, design, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Pop Culture, Profiles
In our time, photo manipulation has become as much a part of fashion photography as the photographers themselves. Without Photoshop, a new photo exhibition, opening this week at Holon’s Beit Meirov Art Gallery, takes that concept to task, presenting works from the 60s, 70s, and 80s by fashion photographer Mula Eshet. In those times, as the title implies, photographers worked hard to present the camera lens with the most arresting and interesting scenarios because there were no second chances.
In a radio interview today, Eshet said that he, together with his wife, the artist Dalia Eshet, always tried to find unusual locations and tell a story that expressed thought and originality. Venues like the Dead Sea, the zoo, the streets of Tel Aviv and even the Lebanon War were his backdrops. The couple served as stylists, makeup artists, directors, producers, designers — even model scouts, as there were no modeling agencies when they first started.
Eshet: “In the pre-modeling agency days, the relationship between fashion houses and myself was direct. Entire collections were sent to my studio and from that moment on until I got the photo I wanted I dealt with finding the models, designing and producing the image (including location and accessories) — and ‘decorating’ the model (the term ‘styling’ didn’t exist [in Israel])”.
Dalia Eshet: “He loved select the ones that came with a background in dance and movement. The model’s personality was an important component expressed in his photography”.
The exhibition presents photographs of those personalities, including Israel’s leading fashion models of the period, such as Penina Rosenblum circa 1972, before she became Israel’s most famous cosmetics queen / reality show / hoochie mama / ex-Knesset member…
Heli Goldberg went on to an acting career – including one of her best-known roles as a shopping cart bashing pudding thief in “The Battle For Milky” commercial…
The amazing Michaela Berko, Israel’s first 80s supermodel export (who recently paid homage to her famous Vogue cover on the cover of Israel’s La-Isha magazine)…
Exotic Tami Ben-Ami, who lived a supermodel’s life before they gave it a name. She dated wildly popular basketball player Aulcie Perry and was Gottex’s first house model. Sadly, she died of cancer in 1995 at just 40 years old.
The exhibition photos were selected from tens of thousands of images saved by the Eshets over the years, published in Israeli fashion magazines, catalogs, posters, ads and more. Definitely worth checking out, as is this report about Mula Eshet in his heyday.
Foto Friday – Tal Menkes’ Dreadful Delights
Filed under: Art, Blogging, design, Entertainment, Foto Friday, General, Israeliness, Picture of the Week, Pop Culture, Profiles
Tal Menkes is a copywriter at advertising agency Mccann Erickson, Tel-Aviv, Israel. In addition to his day job of penning award-winning ads, Menkes’ fevered brain works overtime several times a week to create Mutzar Ayom, a photoblog of seemingly useful yet cheerfully useless objects.
The name takes the hackneyed shopping channel phrase mutzar ha-yom, “product of the day”, and replaces it with the word ayom, meaning “horrible”. And indeed, many of the products are in fact, delightfully dreadful examples of visual wordplay.
Some of the ideas are universal in nature — others are unmistakably Israeli, for example, this toy soldier armed with mother’s cooking…
Water concentrate, as opposed to the ubiquitous sugary red mitz petel, so ingrained in the Israeli child’s psyche — and the Israeli child’s teeth!
A reversed three-fer electric adaptor…
A floor squeegee that actually gets into corners…
And my personal favorite, the real and original dubon coat.
Menkes also runs a Mutzar Ayom Facebook page in which followers are invited to comment on recent postings and share their own imaginary product ideas. Who knows, some might even make it into production — after all, if the Crembox can be an actual product fulfilling an actual need, then anything’s possible.
Foto Friday – LunchBox cooking up a photo project
Filed under: Art, Blogging, design, Food, Foto Friday, General, Israeliness, Travel
Publishing house LunchBox specializes in creating beautifully designed cookbooks that are as fun to read as they are to use. The Tel Aviv-based company is the brainchild of Ofer Vardi, established journalist and foodie, who last year published the first Israeli cookbook app for iPhone and iPad.
Israel To Go is the name of a new cookbook slated for release in the coming months. The book, says Vardi, will present kosher Israeli cuisine with recipes and artwork solicited via crowdsourcing, which is an open call conducted mainly via online social networks, such as Facebook.
Photo: Untitled - Sasha Abramowitz
Contributing artists include Tali and Jonathan Korman, graphic designers with a sideline in fashion. Their T-shirt company, Bubulu Design, features images inspired by life in Tel Aviv — like this one, Hallo Artik, which pays homage to the humble beachfront popsicle vendor.
Photo: Hallo Artik – Bubulu Design
“We are looking for photos, artwork, drawings and graphic works documenting the Israeli culinary experience wherever it is. For example, a family dinner, people cooking, children playing with food, unique dishes, a special angle or places and situations that make your mouth water. Every artist has their own take on things, and their own taste.”
Photo: Israeli Breakfast – Orit Kovatz
“Israel To Go will be published in A6 (postcard) format – small, sweet and sassy. This size allows tourist to carry the book easily in their bag or pocket and take it home as a souvenir — a delicious gift for friends and family.”
Photo: Jerusalem – Benny Sharoni
Lunchbox is still soliciting artwork submissions and while the project does not pay it does offer exposure and, of course, copies of the book. In addition, Vardi says, “We also hope to organize an exhibition with the launch of Israel To Go in bookstores.”
Photo: Dining Room – Adi Kfir
Interested artists and photographers are invited to submit according to the following specifications: 1. Files in jpeg or eps in full color (CMYK) and print quality (dpi300); 2. Vertical work size: width: 11 cm, height: 16 cm, lateral work size: width: 22 cm, height: 16 cm. 3. Contact details: First Name (English only), Last Name (English only), email address and website (if any). Works should be sent to israeltogo1@gmail.com. Deadline is January 15th.
Subscribe
Subscribe to Israelity via email:
Social Media
Categories
- A New Reality
- Art
- Blogging
- Business
- coexistence
- Crime
- design
- education
- Entertainment
- Environment
- Food
- Foto Friday
- General
- health
- History and Culture
- Holidays
- Immigrant Moments
- Israeliness
- Life
- Medical Breakthroughs
- Movies
- Music
- News
- Nostalgia Sunday
- Picture of the Week
- Politics
- Pop Culture
- Profiles
- Religion
- Science
- Social Justice
- Sports
- Technology
- Travel
- tv
- War
The Face of Israel Today
-
About Israelity
Free newsletter
Stories from ISRAEL21c.orgPopular Posts