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My dissertation attempted to conceptualize the place of a specific group of traditional Jewish objects, known as shiviti, in Zionist and Israeli contexts, while challenging the common distinction between traditional objects and Zionist... more
My dissertation attempted to conceptualize the place of a specific group of traditional Jewish objects, known as shiviti, in Zionist and Israeli contexts, while challenging the common distinction between traditional objects and Zionist and Israeli art and visual culture. The shiviti, I argued, represents the diasporic, symbolic, religious and masculine affinity to Judaism's holy places – the Land of Israel, Jerusalem, and the place of the sanctuary. This affinity has changed dramatically with the advent of Zionism, however, as it became a real, secular – still masculine though – political theology of sovereignty over the holy places. Using visual perspective, the research sought to understand this comprehensive transformation, raising basic questions regarding foundational assumptions of Zionist and Israeli art historiography. I asked to challenge the preference given to archeology as a basis for the understanding of Zionist visual culture, and the dominance of modern Western art history for the interpretation of Israeli art, while underestimating the role of modern Jewish ethnography. The domination of masculine perspectives, that was shared by the shiviti, Zionist visual culture and Israeli art, lay at the foundation of another question – in what ways does Jewish feminist art undermine this masculine aspect, or alternatively, does it reproduce it, giving it a progressive outfit while maintaining its oppressive aspects.
Jacqueline Nicholls’s art addresses Jewish-religious themes from a gender perspective, often using textiles and a range of sewing and embroidery techniques. In this paper I discuss two of her works – Maybe This Month, about the laws and... more
Jacqueline Nicholls’s art addresses Jewish-religious themes from a gender perspective, often using textiles and a range of sewing and embroidery techniques. In this paper I discuss two of her works – Maybe This Month, about the laws and rituals of niddah, and Ghosts and Shadows: The Women Who Haunt the Talmud, which relates to female figures in the Talmud. Both compositions feature text embroidered in white thread on white fabric. I draw on feminist theories about the act of writing and explore the ways in which Nicholls’s aesthetic choices and, in particular, the one to embroider text, function in the works with respect to questions of religion and of gender. I discuss the works alongside canonical-religious texts and point out how visual images created by a woman using a “feminine” artistic technique respond to texts produced by men within a masculine tradition of writing.
In this study, I focus on the Ladies Guild Collection, works of art by the British Jewish Orthodox artist Jacqueline Nicholls. Created in 2009–2012, the collection underscores the marginal place of women in the synagogue and in the... more
In this study, I focus on the Ladies Guild Collection, works of art by the British Jewish Orthodox artist Jacqueline Nicholls. Created in 2009–2012, the collection underscores the marginal place of women in the synagogue and in the canonical Jewish literature and its link to other forms of women’s marginalization in contemporary culture. In particular, it attributes a major role to the present-day struggle of “Women of the Wall”(WoW), a Jewish feminist organization whose goal is to ensure the equal rights of women to pray in the Western Wall plaza. Nicholls’ collection highlights the way in which the organization and its goals became popular within Jewish feminist circles and suggests a connection between this specific community’s struggle and the political issue of gender segregation at the Western Wall. I trace the historic transition of the Western Wall from a holy site under the Ottoman Empire, without any particular customs or rites and without gender separation, to its status since 1967 as an Israeli “national synagogue,” which features both Orthodox synagogue rites and national ceremonies and thus has come to be a provocation to the adjacent Islamic holy places. I argue that WoW’s goal of establishing the Western Wall as an egalitarian synagogue would strengthen Zionist sovereignty over the site and would dampen the oppressive power relations that unfold at the plaza. Instead I suggest to seek for a new path for the jewish feminism political horizon, a path which will lead to solidarity and cooperation among women from the different political groups.
The discussions about the Niddah and its representations in contemporary art are saturated with the concept of abjection — a term that deals with repressed cultural phenomenon such as the menstruation blood and other physical discharges.... more
The discussions about the Niddah and its representations in contemporary art are
saturated with the concept of abjection — a term that deals with repressed cultural
phenomenon such as the menstruation blood and other physical discharges. Although the
association of Niddah with abjection seems appropriate, the latter was developed within
a secular discourse, which perceives the Halakha (a set of Jewish laws) as a permanent
and unchangeable canon which is the product of a patriarchal and anachronistic religion.
The discussion I propose in this paper is based on a dynamic perception of the Halakha as
a constantly changing body of knowledge, influenced by a wide range of social matters.
Therefore, I offer a discussion in the representation of Niddah utilizing the concept of
appropriation, which will allow us to discern the mutual influences of Halakhic, aesthetic,
and gender issues.
MUZA 1 • 2017
108
As a case study, I will analyze the discourse regarding My Patchwork Quilt (2004), an
artwork by Hagit Molgan. I contest the common reading of this work as a representation
of "rebellion" against the ritual of Niddah. instead, I offer an alternative reading, claiming
that Molgan isn't "rebelling" against the ritual, but rather resisting the masculine control
of it — by appropriating the Niddah in order to resist the patriarchal cultural structures.
Accordingly, I argue that when artworks appropriate gendered-Halakhic themes, the
artistic action influences the Halakhic discourse as well as the gender discourse. Conceived
this way, such artworks can (and should) be read not only from a worldview informed
by the binary permanent positions articulated throughout the secular discourse — but as
part of a dynamic perception, one that acknowledges the political agency of art.
I discuss the work "Ghosts and Shadows: The Women Who Haunt the Talmud" of Jacqueline Nicholls alongside one Talmudic episode. I point out how visual image created by a woman using a “feminine” artistic technique respond to texts produced... more
I discuss the work "Ghosts and Shadows: The Women Who Haunt the Talmud" of Jacqueline Nicholls alongside one Talmudic episode. I point out how visual image created by a woman using a “feminine” artistic technique respond to texts produced by men within a masculine tradition of writing.
Emmanuel Levinas's philosophy asks us to look at the face of the Other, the stranger and foreigner, and to listen to its outcry. According to Levinas, the exposed face of the Other exposes the onlooker and compels him or her to comply... more
Emmanuel Levinas's philosophy asks us to look at the face of the Other, the
stranger and foreigner, and to listen to its outcry. According to Levinas, the
exposed face of the Other exposes the onlooker and compels him or her to
comply with its outcry. Our ability to look at the Other's face is bound to
lead us to a reformed world.In many of the works shown in "Broken Beads:
Contemporary Artists on their Moroccan Identity," the faces of the artists or
the people they portray are seen either looking straight forward at the viewers,
or intentionally and consciously hiding them. The face serves as a weapon
or a means of communication. Here, it becomes a medium for changing
the viewer's consciousness, by making him or her look at a new, complex,
variegated, three dimensional and rich human image, instead of seeing the
habitual, one dimensional, stereotypical image of the "Moroccan."
בתערוכה חרוזים שבורים: אמנים עכשוויים על זהותם המרוקאית נראים בעבודות רבות פניו של האמן או האמנית, או של הדמויות בעבודותיהם, כשהם מישירים מבט אל הצופים, או כשהם נוקטים הסתר פנים. הפנים משמשות כאמצעי לשינוי תודעתו של הצופה, מהתבוננות... more
בתערוכה חרוזים שבורים: אמנים עכשוויים על זהותם המרוקאית נראים
בעבודות רבות פניו של האמן או האמנית, או של הדמויות בעבודותיהם, כשהם
מישירים מבט אל הצופים, או כשהם נוקטים הסתר פנים. הפנים משמשות
כאמצעי לשינוי תודעתו של הצופה, מהתבוננות בדימוי סטריאוטיפי של
'המרוקאי/ת' נקרא הצופה להבחין בדימוי אנושי חדש, מורכב ועשיר.
This thesis focuses on the practice of "Nidah" – a ritual performed by Jewish women to purify themselves of menstruation blood – as it is conveyed in works made by contemporary female Jewish artists. This study criticizes the current... more
This thesis focuses on the practice of "Nidah" – a ritual performed by Jewish women to purify themselves of menstruation blood – as it is conveyed in works made by contemporary female Jewish artists. This study criticizes the current discourse surrounding the representations of Nidah and offers an alternative methodological model for their discussion: the proposed model challenges the secular perspective of "Nidah" and its representations, which perceives the Halacha (a set of Jewish laws) as a permanent unchangeable concept, a product of a patriarchal and anachronistic religion. This view thus judges artworks dealing with the Halacha either as a ratification or subversion of the Halachic masculine position. The diversion I propose in this paper from the current discourse is based on a perception of the Halacha as constantly changing and as influenced from varied social issues within which it is practiced. Respectably, I claim that when artworks appropriate gendered-Halachic issues – like in the case of Nidah that is discussed in this study – the artistic action influences the Halachic discourse as well as the gender discourse, and the artworks generate change in both the Halachic and the gender perspectives. In this way, I argue, such artworks can be read not only from a worldview formed of binary permanent positions articulated in the secular discourse, but as part of a dynamic perception, that acknowledges the political agency of art.
The questions discussed in this research relay in three intersecting fields of knowledge: aesthetics, gender, and Jewish thought, running across the chapters of this study. The varied aesthetic elements that comprise the artworks on Nidah are examined in light of feminist and Jewish texts. The analysis is formulated in terms of both religious and gender appropriation. This study comprises of three chapters, and each chapter analyzes a contemporary case study.

At the heart of the first chapter lays a historiographical criticism relating to the artistic discourse on representations of Nidah, while suggesting an alternative methodological model. This chapter focuses on the Halachic perception of writings on artworks dedicated to the Nidah. The chapter analyzes My Patchwork Quilt, created in 2004 by the artist Hagit Molgan (b. 1972), in which Molgan deals with Nidah. This artwork was considered in the existing literature as an artistic rebellion against the ritual of Nidah and its laws. This happened without any attempts to interpret Molgan's aesthetic choices in light of Halachic texts. This chapter consists of criticism of this common approach, based on the writing of Orna Oryan on Molgan’s work, and offers a new perspective that anchors it in religious texts as well as artistic and gendered context.
The second chapter offers a critical theoretical approach to the term abjection, which is common in the discourse on Nidah and its representations in particular, while proposing an alternative view of the ritual of Nidah, one that isn't based on abjection. In this chapter I discuss the concept of abjection, dealing with what the subject represses, especially with the way the term was developed in the writings of Julia Kristeva. The chapter refers to the different theoretical sources of abjection and its varied criticism. I point to an inherent failure in an attempt to discuss the issue of Nidah via the discourse of abjection, as done to date. My proposition is to perceive the Nidah as a ritual that has been patriarchal appropriated, yet can be reclaimed anytime. As a case study I analyze an article by David Sperber, in which he discusses representations of Nidah using the term "abjection", and I demonstrate how using this term harms the culmination of different contexts of representation.