ABOUT
Site Title
I’ve done creative work all my life – painting, ink and pencil drawings, sewing tapestries, carpentry, decoupage, metal work, print making, etc. It was always a sideline, a hobby, nothing I ever considered doing professionally. I began my professional life in New York City (after growing up in Syracuse, New York) - high-pressured, career-focused, hard-working New York.
When I moved to Israel in 1990, I brought my hard working style with me. Busy with adjusting to a new country and a new life, falling in love with it physically and with the people, I had much to learn and to accomplish. There was little time for art or hobbies.
Then, at some point I needed more, and a return to creative hand work was a natural. I found my way to the studio of Jerusalem artist, Mallory Serebrin Jacobs, of the Jerusalem Ceramic Arts Studio. For seven years, I studied with Mallory, learning how to make my first pinch pot and turtle, and then so much beyond. Besides being a talented ceramic artist and painter, Mallory is a wise and generous teacher. http://artwo840.wixsite.com/malloryserebrin
The process
I love the limitless possibilities for expression with clay- texture and detail and shape. I love the feel of it, its roundness and pliability. I appreciate the orderliness of the step by step process. Unlike almost any other form of art, the variety of techniques are almost limitless, each applied at the right stage for maximum effect. The degree of moisture in the clay is the pivotal issue. The possibilities of what can be created are unending.
The ceramic world is, broadly speaking, divided into throwers, people who use a potter’s wheel, and hand builders like me, who take a flat slab of clay and shape it into a million different forms. I come from a family of builders, house painters, carpenters and real estate agents and developers. We like building, the step by step addition of one element attached to another and that is what I often do with my art. I’m in the building trades like my ancestors before me.
I often begin my work with a sketch, sometimes with all the details worked out. But ultimately, it’s my intuition that determines the final design, a feeling that something is too heavy or busy or an element is not substantial enough. Ceramic artists have many technical considerations in addition to striving to create a beautiful thing. We tend to be practical people- we have to be.
The purpose
The lives of observant Jews are filled with religious practice that involve all of our senses, our whole body and mind. Ritual objects are often used to enable the performance of these holy acts. A Jew will use the best of what he has to beautify a ritual observance. So the need for fine objects made from silver, wood, fabric and certainly clay dates back thousands of years. I get great pleasure making things used in the performance of G-d’s commandments, the mitzvot.
We eat large multi- course Shabbos meals every week plus holidays and for every major life event, as a part of their enjoyment and celebration. Even when I make a bowl or serving plate, I think of how it will be used to embellish a Shabbos table. Investment in beautiful serving pieces is not a frivolity but a necessity.
Tzfat- Its Influence
I moved to Tzfat in northern Israel after more than 20 years in Jerusalem. Tzfat has let me fall in love with Israel all over again. In my first year living here, my work was fairly similar to the work I had previously done in Jerusalem. Gradually, I’ve absorbed the feel and shape of Tzfat. I spent much time wondering through the alleys and up the many stairs, scouting out the hidden and obscured, a camera in my hand, a permanent tourist in the city where I live.
Tzfat is a city in hiding, enshrouded in mist, behind the clouds, obscured by the mountains, high up, not a place that is easily discerned. The windows, the arches and stonework, the roofs, streetlights, the rag-taggedness of some buildings- a room plopped down on top of some stairs – are all elements I see on my walks and appear in my work. It is endlessly interesting to me.
The Artist Colony was founded in the 50’s and was the center of the Israeli art scene. Tzfat is a town of art and artists, a place where artistry is revealed in the sky and clouds, the sunsets and storms, mist enshrouding the blue hills, drawn by the Great Artist Himself. Gold is the color of Jerusalem. Tzfat is the city of blue- blue hills, blue doors and metal work, the crisp blue air giving every structure a tinge of blue, a city merging with the heavens.
I get rhapsodic talking about Tzfat which I love. It is my place, the place where I was meant to be my whole life. It is the place where I achieve the greatest degree of wholeness, in my work, spiritually, with family and friends. It’s where I hope to spend the rest of my years growing to be the best artist and person I can be.