Art & Culture

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Written by Ministry of Defense and KKL-JNF

Published: 23 April 2023

The 50th Anniversary of the Yom Kippur War: Ministry of Defense and KKL-JNF to Revamp Dozens of Heritage sites in the Golan Heights, Commemorating Yom Kippur War Victims

Sites to be revamped include: Tel Saki, Emek HaBacha, Tel Faher, and others

Families, Commemoration, and Heritage Division at the Ministry of Defense, in partnership with Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael – Jewish National Fund (KKL-JNF) and in collaboration with the Golan Regional Council, is launching a large-scale project to renovate and revamp dozens of monuments commemorating the fallen soldiers of Yom Kippur War across the Golan Heights. These memorial sites, erected after the war to tell the story of the battles and the fallen soldiers, will undergo significant improvement; the project aims to complete works by October, when Israel is to mark the 50th anniversary of a war that claimed the lives of 2,689 fallen soldiers.

Dozens of heritage sites, scattered across the Golan Heights, have become focal points for Israelis visiting the area and participating in battlefield heritage tours. This unique project, initiated by the Ministry of Defense in partnership with KKL-JNF and the Golan Regional Council, is meant to preserve these sites for decades to come. Some of the sites to undergo significant improvement: Tel Saki, Emeke HaBacha, Nati Force, 7th Division (Khativa 7) Memorial, 188-Barak, The Nagmash (armored personnel carrier), Tel Fakher, and others.

Ministry of Defense Deputy Director and Head of Families, Commemoration, and Heritage Division, Arye Mualem: "The Yom Kippur War exacted a high price on the people of Israel. The heritage sites on the Golan Heights commemorating that horrific war have become important focal points for bereaved families, for the general public, and for tourists visiting from all over the world. As the Ministry of Defense prepares for the 50^th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War, we are launching a large-scale project in collaboration with KKL-JNF and with the Golan Regional Council which aims to honor the memory of those fallen during the Yom Kippur War.

KKL-JNF Chairwoman Ifat Ovadia-Luski: "The fallen soldiers of the IDF have made the ultimate sacrifice - their lives - for the State of Israel and its people. As a society, we must repay them and their families for this sacrifice. The JNF works tirelessly to honor and commemorate the fallen IDF soldiers. We are proud to take part in this important initiative to commemorate the fallen soldiers of the Yom Kippur War, together with the Ministry of Defense. This is one of our top missions as a nation, to know and cherish our heritage, our wars, and most importantly - the story of the people who have made our life here possible."

Photo Credit Spokesperson and Public Relations Department at the Ministry of Defense

Video link: https://we.tl/t-5W7R9n2jCZ

Video credit: Spokesperson's Office and Public Relations, Ministry of Defense

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Written by Silvia G. Golan

Published: 13 April 2023

The city of Maghar hosted a unique interfaith Iftaar dinner on Monday, March 27th at the Eshkol Pais center. Iftaar is the traditional meal eaten to break the fast each evening during Ramadan, celebrated by nearly 2 billion Muslims around the world. As a festive gathering, iftaar also presents a great opportunity for cultural exchanges. Maghar, in northern Israel, recently hosted a special Iftaar, with students from the Center for Outstanding Students, the mayor of the city, and the ambassador and deputy ambassador of Malta. 

The evening opened with a bilingual welcome from the head of the program, Hiam Asakly, followed by the Mayor of Maghar, Mr. Fareed Ganem, who praised the work of the students, and expressed the importance of intercultural exchange in Maghar, which is home to three religions. Then the students began their presentations–spanning the history of village and the origins of its name (possibly from the many caves in the region), to favorite cuisine and holidays, an explanation about the benefits of fasting during Ramadan, and even a trivia competition and explanation of the local dialect spoken in Maghar. 

Among the highlights, the guests learned that Maghar recently gained its status as a city in 2021, and that it was home to Christian, Druze and Muslim houses of worship. A story about the early years of the founding of Israel also highlighted the long-standing commitment of the diverse populations in the city to coexistence.

Following the student presentations, the Ambassador of Malta, H.E. Mrs. Attard-Pirotta, spoke. The ambassador mentioned the important Arabic influence on Maltese culture and the Maltese language. Ambassador Attard-Pirotta also expressed her admiration for the work of the students to focus on communication in foreign languages, and particularly, the commitment to intercultural harmony at such a critical time in history. 

Following the speeches, Muhammad Shini, a local principal and son of the imam of Maghar, recited Quran. Soon it was time for the adhan–the call to prayer, marking the end of the fast, and everyone sat down to dinner. The students also received gift bags from the embassy of Malta, and left looking forward to getting to visit Malta in the future. 

Photo Credit: Hiam Asakly

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Written by Silvia G. Golan & Stella Szpira

Published: 16 April 2023

On April 16, a special project to connect Vietnamese and Israeli cultures, the Viet-Taam restaurant garden, was opened. The restaurant offers Vietnamese Kosher Lemehadrin cuisine in a Vietnamese garden in the heart of Netanya - miniature Vietnam! The Embassy of Vietnam in Israel in coordination with the Viet -Taam restaurant wants to raise another sign in the multicultural road of Netanya that welcomes all cultures.

Viet-taam makes all efforts to provide impeccable service and a delicious, Vietnamese culinary experience that is also Kosher Lemehadrin. Viet-taam is not only a restaurant but also a cultural place for a wide spectrum of ages and interests, a place to relax after a day of work, a place to hear music and promote culture, tourism, also brings each other together and ties friendships. 

Viet Taam offers a truly authentic experience that keeps clients coming back. A talented team works around the clock with passion to offer a mix of fresh flavors in a delectable atmosphere and an excellent service. The guests at the opening event visited the Vietnamese Restaurant, run by owners Mrs. Naomi Fettmann and Rabbi Jean Pierre Fettmann, and tasted the magical and delicious flavors of the far-east.

At the event, the Ambassador’s wife Mrs Trang Pham taught the guests how to prepare Vietnamese delicacies. Ambassador Ly Duc Trung announced that he plans to hold cultural events in the garden, including Vietnamese-style cooking classes, Vietnamese language courses, lectures on tourist sites, and more.

The project was opened in the complex of the Vietnamese restaurant "Viet-Taam" on Tel Chai 1 pedestrian street (corner of Herzl Street) in Netanya. The restaurant is strictly kosher under the supervision of Rabbi Mahfoud. The great demand forced the owner of the restaurant, Asher Patman, to expand it. Therefore, he rented the yard in front of the restaurant, decorated and designed it with Vietnamese paintings and decorations such as round straw hats, colorful paper lanterns, paper umbrellas and the like. Tables and chairs will be placed in this area for the diners, and there will also be a permanent stand of the Embassy of Vietnam with promotional materials and tourist brochures that will be distributed free of charge to those interested.

The refreshments on the opening night last night were based on delicacies from Vietnamese cuisine. The ambassador's wife demonstrated how to make a Vietnamese crepe from rice flour, and then offered the guests who surrounded her a taste of the delicacy she had prepared. It was a sort of first lesson within the cooking courses that will be held here. The ambassador pointed out that Vietnamese fast food is the fastest in the world, but it is usually available only at food stalls on the streets. According to him, a Vietnamese meal in a restaurant takes longer than ours, because the Vietnamese usually talk to each other and to the owner of the restaurant.

Among the distinguished guests were: Netanya Mayor Miriam Fierberg, ambassadors of Colombia and the Dominican Republic and representatives of the embassies of the Philippines, India, Japan and Sri Lanka, the Netanya Municipality, Efraim Bulmash, Deputy Mayor in Charge of Tourism & Foreign Relations and Olga Lurie, General Manager of The Netanya Association for Tourism, and many Israelis who have working relations with Vietnam. Ambassador Trung announced that he also welcomes other embassies to use this place for their cultural events.

Address : Tel Hai 1, Natania

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Written by Silvia Golan & Paloma Lantzman

Published: 28 March 2023

MUZA -  Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv,  announced the opening of the Tel Aviv Biennale of Crafts and Design 2023 - opening to the public on 31.3.2023

Ami Katz, the Director general of the Museum, called the Biennale a   great cultural event in Israel showing about 250 works by Israeli artists and numerous works by artists and designers from abroad. The Tel Aviv Biennale of Crafts and Design, wishes to present a current status of the field of contemporary craft and design in Israel. The theme chosen for the second biennale is " What Is the Measure of Man?" and presents the authors' creative vision for the various circles that surround us and our power to influence the future of the place where we live.

This year, for the first time in the spirit of the Biennale's worldwide theme, alongside the works of about 250 top-class Israeli artists have also works of art and design by international artists whose works respond to ancient cultures and traditions.

The Biennale, which spans most of the museum's exhibition spaces, combines contemporary "craft" works with archaeological and ethnographic treasures from the museum's collection. Outdoor works of an installation, sculptural or architectural nature will be displayed in the open spaces.

The Tel Aviv Biennale of Crafts and Design is a natural extension of the ongoing focus of MUZA, Eretz Israel Museum, on local material culture. The Biennale presents an up-to-date picture of contemporary crafts and design in Israel, including ceramics, glass, jewelry making, textile and paper -in combination with one another. In addition to forging connections between these different fields, it engages with MUZA's historical pavilions and archaeological and ethnographic treasures. The museum's outdoor spaces will feature outdoor works including installations, sculptures, and architectural structures.

Museum CEO: Ami Katz

Curators Arietta Eliezer Bruner, Nir Harmat, Tomer Sapir

International guest curator: Dr. Kevin Murray 

The director of the biennale and one of its founders: Dr. Debby Hershman 

Ami Katz, CEO of the Museum, said today: "The second biennale is of extraordinary scope and depth, and it is even more important than the first biennial in which we demonstrated our ability and positioned the Museum as one of the three most important museums in Israel." It is more important because it is bigger, more comprehensive and more relevant. It is more important because this time we are giving a platform to artists and designers from abroad."

The theme of the second biennale, curated by Arietta Eliezer Bruner, Nir Harmat and Tomer Sapir, is "What is the measure of man?". This theme is based on a saying of the Greek philosopher Protagoras, born in the 5th century BC, who stated that "man is the measure of all things." Under this title, the Biennale seeks to examine the extent of the influence of creative man and his actions on the world around him, as well as on His inner world. It examines and redefines the scope of action and the ability inherent in it to offer a balm in our search for a sustaining world and a humane future.

In the Biennale, different perspectives are presented about the question, what is the measure of man? And in the spirit of the ancient philosophers, miniature worlds are created throughout the museum - in the gallery of the Rothschild Center there is a world that tells a story in four chapters inside a "white cube". In the permanent pavilions: ceramics, copper, glass, the center of Adam and his labor and domes that create dialogues that transcend time, space and countries.

The outdoor works and in the tower gallery present living environments, works that touch on research, science, nature and biodiversity, works that change over time and those that deal with sound, light and movement. During the Bienniale period, three academic incubators of leading design institutions in Israel will be hosted in the Migdal Gallery, one after the other. The participants of the incubators will present unique projects inspired by the theme of the biennale, with a research, dynamic and boundary-pushing approach.

For the first time, the Biennale also presents several dozen contemporary craft and design works from around the world selected by Dr. Kevin Murray, an international guest curator, the works create dialogues with the local works, past and present. "The heart and essence of the Biennale is craft and design the contemporary in Israel," says Dr. Debby Hershman, director of the biennial and one of its founders: "However, in a globalized world, Israeli creators maintain a dialogue with the world, are influenced by it, and influence it. Likewise, the MUZA Biennale aims to recognize and create a dialogue with the International community of creators, with an emphasis on artists who create like us inspired by an ancient cultural tradition in an innovative and changing world."

The curators of the exhibition write: "We stand at roads, we seek refuge, look at the blue sky full of clouds and savor the moment. It is a pleasure mixed with sadness and worry, since the sky may change. The sky above future generations will not necessarily be blue, it may be cloudy, and things that until today were Taken for granted are no more. This is a moment of nostalgia for the present: we embrace the present and prepare for the future that awaits us with its complex challenges, in all aspects of our existence."

About the creators and works at the 2023 Tel Aviv Art and Design Biennale:

Among the artists participating in the biennale, designed by the designer and artist Prof. Hanan de Lange: Yonatan Ullman, Shlomit Bowman, Hanan Abu Hussein, Farid Abu Shakra, Aryeh Berkowitz, Noa Ben-Nun Melamed, Dov Genshroa, Omri Danino, Galia Healy Pastrnak, Hani H Tiv, Goni Kharlap, Sahar Miyari, Vared Kaminsky, Esther Knobel, Daganit Stern Shoken, Pogi Naim, Sasha Serber, Novia Yamaguchi, Dina Shenhav, Moshe Ruas and many others.

Also, groups of artists, including the "Metabolism" group, which includes 12 designers, creators and lecturers, are also presenting at the exhibition; Groups of social artists like Kucinta, seek asylum in Africa; Iota - design for social change. Among the prominent international artists are Francisca Gili from Chile, Maria Fernanda Paz de Baris from Brazil, and the South African artist Andila Deilwani, who will come to the opening of the exhibition.

Among the works, made of different materials and mediums, one can find, for example, in the gallery at the Rothschild Center the works of Nadia Adina Rose, a family album, which Micah is decorated with images of plants, which were once like it in many homes, and sometimes they were even passed down from generation to generation. The quilt breaks down into digital, three-dimensional pixels, expressing the fragility of the family unit and the fickle possibilities it embodies within; Michel Platnik's work Genesis draws inspiration from the book of Genesis. Through pictorial, sculptural, theatrical and cinematic means, a kind of play for one actor is created in which the creation of the world is described, followed by the use that man makes of it, leading to the end of nature. Vitrina, a series of small and delicate works, by Pogi Naim was created while disassembling and reassembling objects that were locked behind the glass of the showcase in the artist's grandmother's house. This time she opens, touches, traces the material and the memory, disassembles and reassembles, thus charging the objects with a new meaning.

For the dialogues presented in the museum's various pavilions, works were chosen that were inspired by or in connection with the collections of the MUZA, the Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv. For example, Dana Bloom's work, whose size simulates a golden snake shedding its skin to allow its body to grow, the human "descendant" that it is A creator testifies to the transformative essence of the circle of life. Tamar Or presents the balance scale next to the coffins from ancient Egypt, and directs her own "weighing of the heart" ceremony, in which the scales of justice are in a continuous state of imbalance; Dina Shenhav's work, a city, presents a kind of ruin whose remains The charred ones symbolize a frozen moment in time, as well as the cyclical nature of history, and the transition from era to era where cultures rise and fall and remnants of one era become the building blocks of the era that follows.

The works of the artists from abroad correspond with the contemporary works and with the museum's exhibits: Deilwani's impressive work, UYalezo - New Traditions is a tribute to the spiritual tradition and its roots in the Xhosa ethnic group in South Africa; the Australian Jenny Camara Martinelli creates and restores a vessel in the indigenous tradition, which she designs In glass; Bik Tiu, incorporates motifs of Chinese heritage in her works: elements such as tea leaves and peony petals are carefully assembled, giving form and substance to life in exile. The series of metal objects reflects the experience of migration from East to West.

The outdoor works, which have an installation, sculptural and architectural nature, include spectacular works: Sacha Serber in his work Ozymandias continues his research on ancient sculptures, cultural and archaeological symbols, and on the way in which moving cultural assets from the place where they were created to a museum or an artificial archaeological park changes the viewer's attitude towards them; Nobuya Yamaguchi is inspired by a silver cocoon of a butterfly that lives in the Amazon forest. Similar to an in-body experience, the sculpture contains a sound work created by a recording artist in northern Japan, in which the voice of the Higurashi insect appears which is heard in nature in a short period of time. Galia Healy Pasternak observes her living body as if imprisoned in an urn and unfolds the story of a woman, mother and creator of her own I mage. On the face of the urn, the holy vessel, stories of contemporary tradition and culture are painted and they describe the artist's fears and desires; Hani Khatib examines the visible and the hidden and the barrier that separates them. Khatib, who grew up in a conservative Druze society characterized by prohibitions and restrictions, creates an entrance to another personal space, one that allows us to question and observe reality in new ways.

The Tel Aviv Art and Design Biennale is organized in collaboration with the Association of Creative Artists in Israel, Betzalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem; Shenkar – Engineering/Design/art; HIT Holon Institute of Technology and Tel Aviv Jaffa Municipality.

Activities and events:

The Tel Aviv Biennale of Crafts and Design 2023  will open to the general public on March 31 and will close during the month of November 2023

The biennale is accompanied by a blog, an app and an audio guide. During it there will be various activities and events: workshops, activities for the whole family, lectures, gallery talks, meetings with artists, tours, and an International conference.

Tel Aviv Art and Design Biennale 2023 / Muza - Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv

Address: Muza, Eretz Israel Museum, Tel Aviv. 2 Haim Levanon St., Ramat Aviv, Tel Aviv

Ticket price: 52 NIS

Children up to the age of 18: free of charge Soldiers: NIS 26 Students: NIS 35 Senior citizens: NIS 26

Opening Hours:

Monday, Wednesday 10:00–16:00

Tuesday, Thursday 10:00–20:00

Friday 10:00–14:00

Saturday 10:00–18:00

Sunday the museum is closed

Phone Numbers: 

Switchboard: (03) 641-5244

Shop: (03) 745-5716

Events: (03) 643-6172

 https://www.eretzmuseum.org.il/

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https://www.instagram.com/eretzisraelmuseum/

Photos by Silvia Graciela Golan

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