Foto Friday – Drora Spitz
Filed under: Art, design, education, Foto Friday, General, History and Culture, Profiles, Technology, Travel
Photographer Drora Spitz is one of Israel’s leading lights in the field of artistic and architectural photography. Since 1972, her art works have been presented at museums and galleries in Israel, Germany, Spain, the US and the UK. Between 1978-2004, Spitz was director of the Department of Photography at the Faculty of Architecture, Urban Planning & Design at Technion, the Israel Institute of Technology, where she also taught photography.
Last week marked another high point in her career: the launch of a book, LIGHT SPACE TIME, which showcases selected works from the past forty years.
Spitz is fascinated by structures and spaces, whether monumental or minute. She chronicled the Sinai desert throughout the 1960s and 70s and the first chapter presents its primordial scenery and diverse populations. Also at that time, she followed the late Israeli sculptor Itzhak Danziger, documenting his conceptual experiments with landscape. (More about Danziger’s work here).
It was during the 70s, while undertaking complicated lab experiments, that Spitz says she invented processes which preceded digital photography. Today, she states, digital technology aids her in interpreting reality in new, conceptual ways. Her recent works, Paper Landscapes, are photos that are deconstructed and then reconstructed, digitally redrawn in bold colors and reproduced in multiple.
The photographs presented today are from the series Light in the Mirror Of Time documenting a Bible handed down through Spitz’s family for 300 years. Spitz’s architectural sensibility transforms pages, thickened by years of use, into geological strata, reflective oases and fantastic land formations.
The book LIGHT SPACE TIME Drora Spitz Photographs 1968-2009 is available for sale at the museum stores of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art; the Haifa Museum of Art; the Tel-Hai Open Photography Museum; as well as at Yudan bookstores in Haifa and Zichron Yaacov; and via internet order. Cost: NIS 195 including VAT and shipping (in Israel).
Nostalgia Sunday – Earth. Water. Tree. – Itzhak Danziger
Filed under: Art, design, education, Environment, General, History and Culture, Israeliness, Nostalgia Sunday, Profiles, Travel
Earth. Water. Tree., a new show examining environmental aspects in the work of Israel Prize laureate Itzhak Danziger opens this week at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. The location is a natural fit; as well as being an artist, sculptor and landscape designer, Danziger was a professor at the Technion’s Faculty of Architecture.
Danziger’s most famous work is the statue entitled “Nimrod” which was commissioned for the Hebrew University in 1939 when the artist – freshly returned from art school in London – was only 23. The statue, made of red sandstone from Petra, depicts the biblical king as a youthful hunter, bow in hand and a hawk on his shoulder.
At the time of its unveiling, the nude modernist sculpture caused something of a scandal but was shortly thereafter, says Wikipedia, “acclaimed as a major masterpiece of Israeli art, and has noticeably influenced and inspired the work of later sculptors, painters, writers and poets up to the present.”
“The Nimrod statue was also taken up as the emblem of a cultural-political movement known as ‘The Cannanites’ which advocated the shrugging off of the Jewish religious tradition, cutting off relations with Diaspora Jews and their culture, and adopt in its place a ‘Hebrew Identity’ based on ancient Semitic heroic myths – such as Nimrod’s. Though never gaining mass support, the movement had a considerable influence on Israeli intellectuals in the 1940s and early 1950s.”
The current exhibit looks at the adult Danziger’s later career from the early 1970s until his death in 1977. Curator Sharon Yavo Ayalon writes “For many, Danziger is identified with ‘Nimrod,’ the figurative-archaic statue he created in 1939 that was repeatedly chosen as the quintessential Israeli masterpiece. Few were aware of his environmental work, to which he brought an innovative perception of the landscape as a system that combines both ecological and cultural elements.”
“His experimentation with subjects like conservation and restoration, and his field and theoretical studies of the issues of earth, water and tree, are a source of inspiration for contemporary artists, architects and scientists grappling with issues that Danziger long ago identified as urgent and acute, and that should never again be allowed to disappear from the public awareness.
True to his Canaanite roots, Danziger “offered a new model of the Israeli, one who found a different way to wander across the country, exploring its treasures and its open spaces, appreciating its natural and cultural qualities – and crafting the ideal relationship between society on the one hand, and place, environment, sites, landscape, art and history on the other.”
“For Danziger, earth, water and tree were natural elements that carried multiple meanings. Earth meant land and ground for rehabilitation and garden design; but in its solid state – the rock from which a sculpture emerges – it was also, or perhaps especially, the very earth of the Land of Israel from which one could elicit the ancient cultural milieu. It was that relationship, he felt, which would allow him to flourish and nurture his roots.”
“He was inspired as well by water. Its natural and aesthetic association with holy places, and the methods of channeling it across the landscape, found expression in many of his sculptures and drawings, and was central to his environmental work.”
“The tree, on the other hand, is an organic link between earth and water and between earth and the human being… He attached great importance to trees, especially in the context of sacred trees and groves.”
The exhibition recreates two legendary environmental installations by Danziger, both evocative of our ancient heritage: “Hanging Artificial Landscape” and “Aqueduct”. Another part of the exhibition is devoted to photographs, drawings and prints connected to the rehabilitation of the Nesher Quarry, the Wadi Sheikh bustan (grove), Hurshat Ha’arba’im (the Grove of the Forty) and his last project: a memorial tree-planting ceremony for the casualties of the Egoz army unit in the Northern Golan, near Nimrod’s Castle.
Sadly, writes Yavo Ayalon, “All those places Danziger tried to rehabilitate were soon ignored and neglected, and in their deteriorated state they cry out, now more than ever, for help. Nesher Quarry is still an abandoned gash in the landscape; the well in Hurshat Ha’arba’im is still in ruins; and there is a demolition order out against the bustan of Wadi Sheikh. The water problem has only worsened.”
Earth. Water. Tree. runs from June 13 to July 30 at the Paul Konrad Hoenich Center for Art, Science and Technology at the Technion’s Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning.
Back to school daze
280,000 students started attending classes this week at universities and colleges throughout Israel. No strikes this year, which comes as a pleasant surprise.
An article in Yediot Aharonot over the weekend offered some interesting facts and stats about the the face of Israeli higher education which might be eye-opening for some, such as…
– There are 66 institutions of higher learning in the country, including 34 academic colleges (or junior colleges as they’re called Stateside) and 24 vocational schools.
– Tel Aviv University boast the biggest student body of the nation’s eight universities with 25,800 students, followed by Hebrew University with 23,000, Bar-Ilan University with 22,00, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev with 20,600, University of Haifa with 18,000, the Technion with 13,000, Ariel College with 11,000 and the IDC in Herzilya with 5,200 students. Evidently the Weizmann Institute – the home of recent Israeli Nobel prize winner Ada Yonath is considered a ‘research institute’ and not listed as one of the country’s universities.
– Out of the 221,000 students studying for a bachelor’s degree, 55% are women, and out of those studying for a master’s, 57% are women.
– Onto more important matters, the university cafeteria with the least expensive sandwiches for sale is Tel Aviv University, with a basic sandwich going for only 3 shekels (not sure what’s in that one, maybe just two slices of bread. While the most costly cafeteria sandwich is found at the Technion for 12 shekels (must be organic brain food).
– For a full meal, Bar-Ilan University tips the scales as the most expensive at 27 shekels ($7) with the University of Haifa trailing the field by offering some entrees at 15 shekels.
– Prices of dormitories also fluctuate with Hebrew University costing the most (between 900-1,300 shekels a month) and the Technion being the cheapest at 360-790 shekels.
With tuition becoming more costly each year, students and their parents are sure to be looking at these extra costs in deciding which institution to apply for. My daughter joined the ranks of the 280,000 students as she began classes this week at the instructional college Muzik, a Tel Aviv-based music school. I know that we’ll be urging her to eat meals in her apartment as much as possible.
Foto Friday – Solar UFOs Over Haifa
Filed under: Environment, Foto Friday, General, Pop Culture, Technology
Haifa is Israel’s home to UFO activity but these objects, although flying, aren’t unidentified. They’re prototypes for the SunHopes project, a breakthrough solar energy product developed by Dr. Pini Gurfil and Dr. Joseph Cory of the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology.
According to the project website, “Lightweight, thin-film photovoltaic cells are attached to the exterior surface of large helium balloons levitating at altitudes ranging from a few meters to a few hundred meters. The electricity generated by the cells is then conducted to the ground using electrical cables…” In other words, higly sophisticated balloon-on-a-string technology!
These magnificent photos document the project’s successful 2007 pilot, in which 50 watts of power were generated. That’s enough juice for only a single dim light bulb, but hey!, that’s what pilots are for. The project is seeking funding for the R&D phase for an upgraded prototype, capable of providing 1 kilowatt of power, and then, as my dad used to say, we’ll be cookin’ with gas.
A word about flying saucers and Haifa. In March 1950, Reuters reported that, “Flying saucers… have been reported skittering in all directions across the heavens above the Mediterranean. In Haifa today, reports circulated that they had been seen over northern Israel.” Throughout the 1980s, tales of mysterious flashing lights were periodically reported by local Haifa rag “Kol Haifa”. A quick flick through Google Hebrew reveals that UFO activity – at least on the part of those actively seeking UFOs – is alive and well. After all, wouldn’t seeing something like this floating over your home one bright day make a true believer out of you?
Weird Wednesday
The medical-oenological world was all aflutter this week. A story hit that researchers at the Technion, the Israeli Institute of Technology have developed a white wine with the same health benefits as red wine by boosting the anti-oxidant properties of your favorite chardonnay.
The ISRAEL21c news desk was equally thrilled at reporting another Israeli contribution to the betterment of society, until we discovered that we’d already run the story in 2002.
At that time, researcher Professor Michael Aviram was asked about the difficulty in finding age-appropriate human test subjects and answered, “For $200 a student will drink or eat anything… But what I need to do is look at the effect on arteries”. This time around, Aviram – clearly a man with a gift for the memorable sound bite – is quoted as saying: “There has been an incredible response from those that have heard about the research, with many thinking of taking up drinking white wine more seriously.”
Now, serious drinking of white wine is indeed the sort of story that should be reported on regularly and championed by organizations like Society of Medical Friends of Wine. However, the Technion spokesman assures us that no new research developments have happened. What is news is that Binymina Wineries, which cooperated on the development, is reportedly going to launch the new product in the US later this year.
No word yet on whether the headache I get after drinking white wine has also been eliminated by the new technology.
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