Panim- Faces of Art and Culture in Israel- July-August 1997

Israel Turns 50 and Artists Join in Worldwide Celebrations

It's not every day that Israel turns 50 and in 1998, the celebrations will stretch across the globe. In what is bound to be an unprecedented year of international exposure for Israeli artists, events and festivals are calling on the best of Israel's cultural offerings to mark the occasion. From Europe to North America, South America to Asia and Africa, dates are being set and plans made for the jubilee year. The Foreign Ministry's Division of Cultural and Scientific Affairs, in conjunction with Israel's missions abroad, the Arts and Culture Administration of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport and the Association for Israel's 50th Anniversary Celebrations, is working with international presenters, foreign governments, Jewish communities and special steering committees to plan and coordinate the various events. The following is a look at some of the upcoming programs.

In Germany, the 1998 Internationales Sommer Theater Festival Hamburg (Aug. 21-Sept. 12) will be dedicated to Israel's 50th anniversary. Israeli artists are no strangers to this festival, one of the largest contemporary theater and dance festivals in Europe. Next year, the "Israel Today" program will include new productions by the Batsheva Dance Company, Rina Yerushalmi's Itim Theater Ensemble and the dance troupe of Liat Dror and Nir Ben-Gal. The Acre Theater Center will mount "Arab Dream," the Diwan ensemble will perform "Between the Walls," and the Zik performance art group will display its pyrotechnic prowess. Following the festival, some productions will tour other German and European cities. The Berlin Festival (July) and the Munich Festival (October) will feature many Israeli artists and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra will conduct a special European tour.

In the United States, the Kennedy Center in Washington DC will present an unprecedented six-week festival entitled "Israel at 50: A Celebration of Statehood," an arts festival devoted entirely to Israeli productions. The gala opening, in the presence of President Clinton and Prime Minister Netanyahu, will take place on February 22, with a concert by the IDF Orchestra and a host of soloists including Yitzhak Perlman. Also scheduled during the six weeks are the Gesher Theater's "City: Odessa Stories," Vayomer, Vayelech by the Itim Ensemble, the Batsheva Dance Company, the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, encounters with Israeli writers including Yehuda Amichai, Amos Oz and A.B. Yehoshua, an Israeli film festival and art exhibits including an exhibition of Jewish and Israeli manuscripts at the Library of Congress..

Other events in the US include the Summer Festival (July) at New York's Lincoln Center which will feature Israeli productions such as the Gesher Theater, a retrospective of Israeli cinema by the Lincoln Center Film Society, Rina Yerushalmi's Itim Theater at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, special programs marking the 50th anniversary at the Israel Film Festivals in New York and Los Angeles, the Midwest-East Festival with Israeli artists including percussionist Chen Zimbalista, and a gala tour by the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.

Israel will officially kick off the local celebrations with the simultaneous lighting of the first Hanukah candle at the President's Residence and in locations throughout Israel and the world. A plethora of events will take place "from Dan to Eilat, from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean sea," culminating on Independence Day. Eilat will host a fashion extravaganza in which leading Israeli and international designers will salute Israel with collections designed specially for the occasion. The desert fortress of Masada will be the sight of concerts by the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and the Cleveland Symphony as well as the premiere of the musical "Masada." The Tel Aviv celebrations will include special concerts in the city's public parks and squares, an international children's song contest, "Children of the World Sing in Tel Aviv," a classical music festival featuring some of the world's leading orchestras and conductors and much more.

For television, the Israel Broadcasting Authority-Israel Television is producing a major historical documentary series entitled "Tkuma: The First Fifty Years." The series picks up where the landmark "Pillar of Fire" left off - with the establishment of the State of Israel. The series examines the key events and decisive milestones that molded the young state, as well as the social, economic and cultural issues faced by Israel over the years. Striving for a balanced and objective historical picture, Tkuma combines archival material including newsreel, documentary and feature film footage, with eyewitness accounts and exclusive interviews with such figures as Yitzhak Shamir, Shimon Peres, Jihan Sadat, James Baker and Hanan Ashrawi.

When completed, Tkuma (Hebrew for "Rebirth") will be available in three versions: a 22-episode Hebrew version, an English version of six one-hour episodes and a two-hour presentation, also in English. The series has been pre-sold to major foreign channels including RTL (Germany), France 2 and channels in Holland, Mexico, Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. The Argentine station Imagen Satelital purchased the full 22-episode Hebrew version for broadcast throughout Latin America.

"Ariel: The Israel Review of Arts and Letters" and Moznayim, the monthly journal of the Hebrew Writers Association in Israel, will jointly produce a double issue for the 50th anniversary. The special edition, devoted entirely to works by the younger generation of Israeli writers, will mark the first time the Hebrew Writers Association in Israel has published a non-Hebrew issue. The commemorative volume of Ariel and Moznayim is set for publication in March 1998 and will appear in English, French, German, Spanish, Russian and Arabic.

SPOTLIGHT

If Israeli pop superstar Achinoam Nini would compose a song for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Chairman Yasser Arafat, she says it would go something like: "Come on already, stop this sandbox bickering ... just make up and let us get on with our lives."

But Nini, known abroad simply as Noa, is not singing political tunes these days. An outspoken leftist, whose last English-language album, "Calling," was, as she puts it "angry, intense and politically motivated," Nini says that right now she has little to say. "I'm just sort of waiting, swinging between moods of despair and hope."

Nini describes her most recent Hebrew release, "Achinoam Nini" (she has released five albums in total; three in Hebrew and two in English, produced by Geffen Records) as "homey, intimate and deeply personal." She sings about folding laundry and not about the troubled peace process. "How much can you shout and scream?" asks Nini with a weltschmerz that belies her 28 years.

She displays a brand of street-smart sophistication mixed in with a let's-all-be-friends naivete. And for such a charismatic powerhouse on stage, on her own turf Nini is surprisingly soft-spoken. A transcendental calm pervades her Tel Aviv apartment (you have to remove your shoes before entering -- "it's more relaxing that way") where she lives with her pediatrician husband, Asher Barak.

Aside from the roses which cover every available surface, a gift from her father following her recent appearance with the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, stage glitter is strictly confined to the stage. A guitar graces one living room chair, a drum is a makeshift coffee table; books line one wall ("I'm a bookworm at heart") and CD's are everywhere.

Slight, dark-skinned, dark-eyed with thick, long, curly locks, Nini looks so Middle Eastern, it's as if you made a wrong turn somewhere when you hear her "oh, man, cool" New York accent. Born in Israel to parents of Yemenite descent, Nini's family moved to the US when she was less than a year old. "We spoke Hebrew at home and English everywhere else," says Nini, whose early musical influences included Simon and Garfunkel, Joni Mitchell, Rogers and Hammerstein (a Broadway aficionado, Nini hints she wouldn't mind a run herself) and Leonard Bernstein.

But Nini says she never felt quite at home in the United States -- even her English-language jazz-tinged rock has a distinctive Mideastern flavor to it -- and at 17 she packed her bags and returned to Israel. After completing high school, she sang with an army entertainment troupe and went on to study at the prestigious Rimon School of Jazz and Contemporary Music. It was there she met guitarist and school co-founder Gil Dor.

In 1990, they performed together at a jazz festival and have since become an inseparable artistic team. She sings (and plays percussion, including the Darbuka, a hand-held Arab drum), Dor plays guitar (and harmonizes); she composes (so does he), he does the musical arrangements. Of her high and Dor's low stage profiles, Nini says, a tad defensively, "it's a matter of personal choice."

It obviously works. Nini and Dor have been enthusiastically received all over the world, especially in Europe and the Far East. They performed "Ave Maria" at St. Peter's Basilica, Rome, before an audience of 100,000, including the pope and Mother Teresa ("one of the highlights of my career,") opened for Sting eight times ("he said we gave him a run for his money") and performed before a packed house at New York's Carnegie Hall (despite Nini's claim that they haven't yet cracked the US market). On home ground, her albums have gone gold, her "gigs" -- a Nini nod to musical Americanese -- are always sold out and she has appeared on just about every local talk show any number of times.

Nini, who always chats with her audience before she sings, says she wants to move people cerebrally and viscerally -- "to remove them, if only for a few moments, from the mundane in their lives." She talks a lot about spirituality. For Nini, only music stands a fighting chance of breaking down cultural barriers. "It has a universal appeal that no other language possesses," says Nini, who in her own way is determined to heal the world.

- Shelley Kleiman

SHALOM-SALAAM

"Dr. Fischer" Prescribes a Peace Remedy in New Art Competitions

Together with the International Artist's Museum, a worldwide association of hundreds of artists, the Fischers developed the competition idea that was born out of a casual conversation. According to the competition guidelines, the theme of peace and co-existence among nations can be expressed through drawing, painting or photography. The competition, "Art for Peace," is open to professional artists from around the world and entries are being accepted until December 31, 1997. More information is available at the competition's website: http://www.art-peace.com.

In early 1998, a committee of judges, including the Fischers, Emmett Williams, president of the International Artist's Museum and Ryszard Waski, the museum director, will select the best 100 works which will then be displayed on the Internet site. The top 30 submissions will be exhibited at the International Art for Peace Gallery, a non-profit organization started by the Fischers aimed at educating and promoting the concepts of peace and co-existence. The five competition finalists will be invited to participate in an art symposium to be held in Israel in 1998.

In addition, the two exhibits of first-day covers, "Artists - Messengers of Peace," have been put on the Internet in their entirety. The exhibits can be accessed at http://www.peace.co.il.

When the Swedish Educational Association of Nonconformist Churches debated how to celebrate its 50th anniversary, Israeli producer Yehuda Fickler suggested inviting children's choirs from countries in states of conflict to meet in a non-competitive, festival setting. This was to be the perfect opportunity for two local girls' choirs, Efroni from Israel's Hefer Valley and Terra Sancta from Bethlehem, to work together. Once again, the calm and serenity of far-off Scandinavia was to offer the ideal setting for an Israeli-Palestinian encounter.

Meanwhile, back in the Middle East, a young Palestinian conductor, Haniya Suda'a Sabara, was starting up the Terra Sancta girls' choir in Bethlehem. Suda'a Sabara had studied choir conducting at Jerusalem's Rubin Academy under Maya Shavit, conductor of the Efroni girls' choir. Bringing the two choirs together for the festival was a natural next step for the two conductors.

With financial assistance from "People to People," a Norwegian-based organization that supports Israeli-Palestinian projects, the two groups began to get acquainted and prepare a program of Hebrew and Arabic pieces. As they persevered toward the June concerts in Stockholm, they had to endure continual upheaval in their rehearsal schedule due to the ever-changing political climate.

Finally, 35 Efroni girls and 37 Terra Sancta girls, aged between 12-18, boarded a flight to Stockholm. There they met choirs from South Africa, Northern Ireland (Catholic and Protestant), Russia, Lithuania, Finland and Sweden. During the course of the week, the children not only rehearsed and performed together, but also participated in various activities aimed at opening the channels of communication, enabling them to listen and learn from each other.

Shavit hopes the Swedish festival will be only the first stage of the relationship between the Efroni and Terra Sancta choirs. Future joint concerts are planned and the goodwill and friendships that have begun will be given an opportunity to grow. As Shavit noted, the chance for a real peace is not only in the hands of the politicians but also in the hands of the artists and the children.

FILM

Shorts by two Israeli film makers, one working in Tel Aviv and the other in Germany, were shown in the official short film competition at the 1997 Cannes Film Festival. Ayelet Bargur, a Camera Obscura graduate, presented her work, "A Good Place to Be" (Makom tov), a loving look at an aging couple in search of just the right burial plots. Animator Gil Alkabetz, who has been working in Germany in recent years, screened his animated short "Rubicon," representing Germany in the competition.

"Marco Polo" a Success at Cannes

After screenings at the International Film Market of the 1997 Cannes Film Festival, Rafi Bukai's "Marco Polo" did brisk business for its distributor, London-based Capitol Films. Distribution contracts have been signed with numerous countries including Spain, Germany, China, Chile, Taiwan, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Iceland, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, Pakistan, Romania, Russia, Singapore, Brunei, Thailand, Turkey and countries of Scandinavia.

Israeli Film Makers Under One Cyber Roof

The INDIC (INDependent Israeli Cinema) web site has recently expanded to include dozens of home pages for Israeli film and television producers, directors, screenwriters etc. Among the film makers who have opened home pages are Marek Rozenbaum, Chaim Sharir, Michal Bat-Adam, Moshe Mizrahi, Movit, Anat Assoulin, Amos Gitai, Eitan Even, Eran Ricklis, Nadav Levitan, Judd Ne'eman and many others. Each home page also includes links to film pages with information and photos of the various films. INDIC receives some 15,000 inquiries per month from industry professionals in Israel and abroad. INDIC's Internet address is: http://www.indic.co.il. The e-mail address is: indiclub@actcom.co.il.

"Black and White is Full of Colors" (Shahor lavan zeh tzivoni) - Documentary:

The therapeutic and enduring power of art in the face of the horror and inhumanity of the Holocaust was Viennese artist Friedl Dicker-Brandeis' gift to the children of the Theresienstadt concentration camp. This moving documentary tells the story of a remarkable woman, a talented Bauhaus artist, who was swept up in the terrible events of the Nazi era but who managed to find a ray of light in the creativity of the children of Theresienstadt to whom she taught art until perishing, herself, in Auschwitz. Two forgotten suitcases found in an attic in Theresienstadt contained some 5,000 drawings by the children in the camp - a living tribute to their spirit. The 56-minute film, shot in the Czech Republic, Vienna, Switzerland, New York and Israel, is the first Israeli-Czech co-production. The film has been shown at festivals around the world including UNESCO, New York, Denver, Munich and INPUT '97. Director: Tamir Paul. Producer: Alona Abt.

"Jewish Vendetta" (Nekama yehudit) - Feature:

For years, Nathan Ilgoyev, a middle-aged Russian immigrant, suspected that his wife had been unfaithful to him. He fakes a heart attack and pretends he is dying in a last-ditch effort to illicit a confession from his wife. It works and he discovers that his wife had in fact had an affair with his best friend in Russia over 30 years before. He jumps up from his "death bed" and dashes off to Russia to murder his best friend and defend his honor. Once in Russia, Nathan's efforts to carry out his vendetta are thwarted by his son who accompanies him, and by the local Russian mafia who also want his best friend dead. Nathan and the mafia race to the finish line with surprising results. Directed by Alexander Shabatayev. Produced by Marek Rozenbaum, Riki Shelah, Gadi Kastel, Zvi Shapira and Pavel Douvidzon.

MUSIC

1997 Bernstein Competition Focuses on Composers

The 1997 Leonard Bernstein Jerusalem International Music Competition is dedicated to composition. The theme for this leg of the three-year competition cycle is the Bible, and other sacred works, as well as secular poetry and literature written in, inspired by or otherwise connected with Jerusalem. Composers aged 21-67 from 40 countries submitted 159 previously unplayed orchestral and chamber works in the first round. Of the 39 pieces that advanced to the semi-finals, six works were chosen for the final selection. Among them, "If I forget thee, Jerusalem" by the Israeli composer Gabriel Irani. They will be performed by the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, in Jerusalem, November 29-December 3.

Composer Gil Shohat Signed by Ricordi

The distinguished Italian music publishing house, Ricordi, has just signed on its youngest composer and its first Israeli, Gil Shohat. The 23 year-old Israeli who is completing his Ph.D. in Italy, wrote one of the two original Israeli works just selected to be part of the required repertoire of the ninth Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Master Competition to be held in Tel Aviv in March 1998. Another new work by Shohat, "The Water's Surface" for strings, harp and narrator, based on Yehuda Amichai's poem of the same name, had its premiere at Milan's Picolo Teatro at the beginning of June.

Gesher Theater Takes the UK by Storm

Sold-out houses, multiple curtain calls, glowing reviews and the British press' endorsement of Gesher as one of the world's leading theater companies greeted the company's first British tour in May-June. Gesher's production of Yehoshua Sobol's "Village" (Kfar) played 25 times in five cities in as many weeks, culminating with a series of performances at London's Lyric Theatre that sold out weeks in advance. "Extraordinary" (Daily Telegraph), "one of the more remarkable companies in world drama" (Times), "one of the world's leading ensembles" (Observer) were but some of the terms used by critics to describe the young company. The National Theater is even said to be considering mounting an English-language production of the hit play.

NEW PRODUCTIONS

Kibbutz Dance Company: New Journeys and a Return to the Past

At the end of May, the Kibbutz company brought its signature piece on the Holocaust, "Aide Memoire" (Zichron dvarim), to Poland for a series of eight performances in Warsaw, Lodz, Krakow and Gdynia. The company performed before capacity crowds and received rave reviews and extensive press coverage. Adding to the poignancy of the experience for both audience and dancers was the return to Poland of Yehudit Arnon, the company's founder, who survived Auschwitz 52 years earlier, and whose first dance was performed in the camp.

"Aide Memoire" is much in demand on the international circuit and bookings are already set for the remainder of 1997 and 1998. In October of this year, the company will perform in Argentina (Buenos Aires), Brazil (Porto Alegre) and Chile (Santiago), and at the Fall Festival in Madrid. In March 1998, the company will take the piece to the United States and Canada (Toronto). Also scheduled for 1998 are tours in France, Germany, Holland and Singapore.

The Kol Demama Dance company, under the leadership of Moshe Efrati, will premiere Anti-Mehikon at the Saloniki International Festival in September. The 70-minute work by Efrati, the Israel Prize-winning founder of Kol Demama ("Sound Silence"), deals with forgetting and repressing memories as ways of letting go of the past. Efrati composed most of the piece's score and edited the accompanying video segment which features personalities who have influenced Efrati through the years including A.B. Yehoshua, Amos Kenan, Yitzhak Rabin, Dahn Ben-Amotz and Yitzhak Navon.

Ethiopian Dance Troupe Shakes Things Up

They came to Israel under the cover of night and a shroud of secrecy in daring rescue operations named Moses and Solomon. Once in Israel, the Ethiopian Jewish community added a new tile to the already diverse ethnic mosaic. Now, a handful of young Ethiopian university students, with the help of veteran choreographer, critic and teacher Ruth Eshel, are enriching the local dance scene with their art and traditions. Together, they have formed the Eskesta Dance Theater.

Four Ethiopian theater students in Eshel's course on movement composition evolved into an 11-member dance group. Improvisation exercises resulted in much of the movement material that composes the company's first artistic program. The name Eskesta is the Amharic term for the shoulder movements typical of Ethiopian dance.

The three-part program takes its inspiration from elements and motifs in the Ethiopian Jewish traditions: ancient prayer chants in Ghez, the sacred language learned from the Kesim, the rabbis of the Ethiopian community, liturgical customs and rituals and children's games. The dancers wear simple, natural cotton robes and provide the musical accompaniment by singing, drumming, whistling and clapping.

Since its creation, the company has performed around the country, at the Karmiel Dance Festival and at the International Jewish Music Festival, Cité de la Musique, Paris. The company is sponsored by the University of Haifa and JDC-Israel.

EVENTS

With the introduction of a new competition for Israeli television dramas, the 14th Jerusalem International Film Festival gets underway this July with a broadened platform for homegrown productions. In addition to the 180 films from 60 countries that will be screened under its auspices (including four films from Iran), the festival will present some 25 original Israeli productions including features, shorts, documentaries, television and student films.

For the first time, seven Israeli television dramas will compete for the Anat Pirchi prize. Other competitions include the Wolgin Awards for Israeli Cinema (for feature, short and documentary films), the Lipper Award for Best Israeli Screenplay, the Wim van Leer "In Spirit of Freedom" Award (an international competition for the best feature or documentary focusing on man's eternal quest for freedom and human rights), the Wim van Leer Award for High School Students (for young film makers from 37 Israeli high school film programs) and an award for films dealing with Jewish themes.

In the Wolgin competition for full-length Israeli feature films, four new films will premiere and compete for the NIS 120,000 prize:

• Beep, directed by Amit Hecht. Producers: Lily and Avi Cassirer, Amit Hecht.
• Minotaur, directed by Jonathan Tammuz. Producers: Mickey Rabinowitz, David Silber, Dan Turgeman.
• Afula Express, directed by Julie Shles. Producer: Assaf Amir.
• "The Milky Way" (Shvil hahalav), directed and produced by Ali Nassar.

Ten documentaries and 12 short films will also vie for Wolgin awards in their categories. Three Israeli films will participate in the "In the Spirit of Freedom" competition, along with 16 international productions.

The festival, housed at the Jerusalem Cinematheque overlooking the Old City, is directed by its founder, Lia van Leer. It is the primary venue for Israeli premieres and a popular gathering place for film makers and film lovers from Israel and abroad.

More information on the festival can be found at the cinemathque's website: http://www.jer.cine.org.il/.

Thousands of dancers and hundreds of thousands of spectators arrived in the Galilee town of Karmiel as Israel's biggest dance festival celebrated its tenth anniversary under the banner of "100 years of Zionism." Scores of folk and ethnic dance troupes from Israel and abroad shared the stage with classical and modern companies such as the Israel Ballet, the National Ballet of Korea, the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company, Hong Kong's City Contemporary Dance Company and the Pact Dance Company from South Africa. Both the Israel Ballet and the Kibbutz company presented works specially created for the festival.

Youth and Art at the Venice Biennale

Yossi Breger, Miriam Cabessa and Sigalit Landau are the young (30's), award-winning artists selected by curator Sarah Breitberg-Semel, to represent Israel at the 47th Venice Biennale. The exhibition at the Israeli Pavilion is entitled "Friction: I-Body I-Language I +You" and, in the words of Breitberg-Semel, addresses an issue that is insufficiently heeded in these times of crisis: "the resistance of the individual to the systems that surround him and threaten to rob him of his selfhood."

Yossi Breger, a Bezalel Academy of Art graduate, positions his "I" within a screen of language in which he strives to salvage a shred of individuality. His work, "Untitled (no.1), 1997," is composed of 62 red canvases with words and numbers stenciled on them. The small canvases which are hung on the wall in a rectangle, appear from a distance like a vibrating screen of words - a language screen - to which the viewer relates.

Miriam Cabessa, a graduate of the Art Teachers' Training College in Ramat Hasharon, exhibits 20 dark, monochromatic oils on masonite. Her "I" is the body, the last barricade of the self, whose physical movement is responsible for her tactile creations.

Sigalit Landau, also a Bezalel graduate, created an installation for the Biennale, "Resident Alien II," a mountainous landscape which erupts inside the confines of a shipping container situated near the entrance to the Biennale gardens. Her work deals with locations, specifically locations of conflict where the weak meet the strong. Her "I" attempts to create a place for herself and others, particularly the downtrodden.

The Israeli Pavilion at the Venice Biennale is sponsored by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.