Foto Friday – A Walk Down Nachalat Binyamin
Filed under: Art, Blogging, Foto Friday, General, Life, Travel, design
Every Tuesday and Friday, there’s a crafts fair on Tel Aviv’s Nachalat Binyamin Street.
There’s no end to the coverage about it, because it is a very good event that has managed to maintain high standards of quality for over a decade and a half — no mean feat, as so many other so-called crafts fairs start out in promising fashion, then sink quickly into a mire of cheap crap from India and China. But the TA municipality keeps close tabs the Nachalat Binyamin artisans and artists, many of whom staff their own booths.
Most visitors pay more attention to the products than the sellers, as is only natural when shopping. And that’s where the photographer’s eye comes in.
Photographer Jessica D. Korman, a recent new immigrant to Israel, took a stroll down Nachalat Binyamin and — aside from snapping shots of the wares for Tchochkes.com, where she is a regular contributor, she also took a look at what goes on around the booths.
Korman, who studied interior design, says she looks for architectural elements wherever she goes, “to present a different view of an object or event.”
“I like photographing everyday scenes,” Korman says, “always looking for a different angle or perspective to the mundane or even the ‘ugly’ side of things.”
A former picture editor for publications such as Scholastic, Star Magazine and Woman’s World Magazine, Korman now works as a Visual Communications Consultant in Jerusalem. “What I love about [photo editing] is that it is the marriage of written content with images. The proper choice of image will enable one’s work to have the greatest impact. Besides, what better job is there than getting to look at pictures all day?”
There’s inspiration everywhere. More of Korman’s work is available on her website, The F Stops Here.
Nostalgia Sunday – Yemenite Embroidery
Filed under: Art, General, History and Culture, Nostalgia Sunday, Profiles, design
Back in the early Sixties, most kids’ mothers wore frilly cocktail aprons to entertain. Not my Israeli mother. Hers looked like this.
And her miniskirts and pantsuits looked like this.
My mother, a singer of international folksongs, had a great collection of gowns. Many were created at Esther Zeitz, a Jerusalem house of fashion that employed a team of Yemenite seamstresses that sat, day in and day out, stitching threads of silver and gold onto splendid garments. Who needed jewels when you had something like this bedecking your neck?
Wearing Yemenite embroidery was very cool among Israeli women who came of age during the 1940s and 50s. This dress was made for my mother when she was a teenager during the 1948 War of Independence.
In the Sixties, after the 1967 war and the reunification of Jerusalem, she combed the Old City looking for a velvet jacket with Bedouin embroidery to wear over a black velvet gown. She found one, too.
In the early Seventies, she scored some Bedouin-style embroidered garments from the Arab Women’s Union of Bethlehem, an embroidery cooperative.
But my favorites will always be the Esther Zeitz outfits. As I recall it, Zeitz – whom I remember as a large woman with swollen arms – closed down in the Eighties when she became too ill to manage. It would be nice to find out more about what happened to the workshop, which was located at the junction of Ben Yehuda and Bezalel streets – I think it is a hairdressers’ today.
My sisters and I wore many of these garments during the Go-Go Eighties. Today, however, they are fragile – the polyester fabric is forever but not the cotton threads that hold down the metallic threads. We are not sure what will happen to this collection, and so decided to document the clothes that, for us, are part of a happy memory.
Ward Off Evil Eyes With Handmade Israeli Jewelry and Jewish Gifts From Israel
‘Tis the season to be jolly, if you are a Christian. But a number of holidays for people of all faiths intersect around this time. It’s more noticeable if you live in the Middle East. Over here in Jaffa a couple of weeks ago, Muslims everywhere were celebrating Eid al-Adha; and Jewish people start lighting candles and gorging on jelly-filled doughnuts for Hanukah starting next week.
But whatever the season, or holiday, unique gift-giving is always something on our minds. When it comes to choosing gifts that are “green” the options are limited even more. One nice way to “say I love you” to someone in a way that is soft on the environment, is to give something handmade. Trendy, with no official religious affiliation is the good old hamsa, one of our faves, which means “five” in Arabic.
According to Wikipedia, an alternative Islamic name for this charm is the Hand of Fatima or Eye of Fatima, in reference to Fatima Zahra, the daughter of Muhammad. An alternative Jewish name is the Hand of Miriam, in reference to Miriam, the sister of Moses and Aaron. It is a kind of “protecting hand” or “hand of God.”
Some associate the significance of the five fingers to the five books of the Torah for Jews, the Five Pillars of Islam for Sunnis, or the five People of the Cloak for Shi’ites.
In recent years some activists for Middle East peace have chosen to wear the hamsa as a symbol of the similarities of origins and tradition between the Islamic and Jewish faiths. The fingers can point up or down.
Among Jews in Israel, it’s considered a Jewish gift, but one appropriate for Muslims, Christians, pagans and the unaffiliated. When I went to see my Catholic cousins in Scotland last year, it was hamsas for everyone.
While the gifts might not be certified green, there are some wonderful gift items in stock on MostOriginal.com, an online jewelry and gifts store that sells handmade artwork by Israeli artists.
Selling Israeli jewelry and Jewish gifts, their hamsas (like Laly Cohen’s Hamsa Hands pictured above), or Kabbalah bracelets, would satisfy even the choosiest friend.
Outdoor folk
Filed under: General, History and Culture, Holidays, Life, Music
Ah, the country fair: a longtime staple of rural living. Folk getting together with other folk to celebrate the harvest moon, life, spiritual festivities and just plain good weather with food, home-made crafts and toe-tapping music.
You wouldn’t find any deep-fried Twinkies or Oreos here, and the crafts skewed towards tie-dies, soul-lifting art, and essential perfume oils, but there’s no doubt that the Third Moshav Country Fair at the Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach-founded Moshav Mevo Modiim fulfilled that down-home need.
With an impressive influx of excited fair-goers, the parking filled up fast and early for a full day of activities for all ages – from jugglers, face painters and story-tellers in the morning to afternoon freestyle rap sessions for modest women and how-to-compost lectures to impromptu yoga sessions and amazing jams in the late evening. Food, more often than not a disappointment when served from trucks by sweaty people to starving hordes, was unpredictably satisfying. There were corn dogs with love from Puff Zaidy, perfectly acceptable felafel by the bagel guy and assorted other treats.
The musical lineup included the biggest names in post-Shlomo music, Ben Zion Solomon and Sons setting the harmonized tone with beautiful mandolin-driven grooves. Shlomo Katz is so awesome with that first name that his trademark sweet vocals seem to be just icing on the cake. A Yehudah Katz of Reva L’Sheva fame turned it all the way up almost to seven. After a quick surprise set by international stars Moshav (including the poignant “Come Back“), a number of younger day-trippers were off to Jerusalem to enjoy that band’s show with Hamakor at the Maabada.
The day didn’t end there, however, as the unbilled finale Semantra – a retooled, retrofitted, and forward-thinking collaboration including Shmuel Nelson and Ari Leichtberg of Shimshak fame – wrapped it all up with an amazing set that left no doubts about this group’s budding greatness.
Subscribe
Subscribe to Israelity via email:
Social Media
Tag Cloud
Food photo exhibition holiday Operation Cast Lead Gaza Sderot hamas Dead Sea photography photographer photograhy nostalgia photographers Paul McCartney knesset israeli nostalgia IDF photo race Foto Friday Music Travel Green Prophet Environment vote coexistence Waltz with Bashir election Tel Aviv Rosh Hashana israeli photography shopping Israel succot Kadima War Israelis Art Religion Politics festival Yom Kippur jerusalem Nostalgia Sunday tourismCategories
- A New Reality
- Art
- Blogging
- Business
- coexistence
- Crime
- design
- Environment
- Food
- Foto Friday
- General
- health
- History and Culture
- Holidays
- Immigrant Moments
- Israeliness
- Life
- Medical Breakthroughs
- Movies
- Music
- Nostalgia Sunday
- Picture of the Week
- Politics
- Pop Culture
- Profiles
- Religion
- Sports
- Technology
- Travel
- War
The Face of Israel Today
-
About Israelity
Free newsletter
Stories from ISRAEL21c.orgPopular Posts