Download - Dov Abramson - Selected Work
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DOV ABRAMSONS e l e c t e d W o r k
Dov Abramson Bio
Born in the US in 1975, Dov moved to Israel in 1983. Growing up in a Modern Orthodox environment, he made a turn at Hesder Yeshiva, and went on to serve for three years in the Intelligence Corps of the Israeli army. Pursuing his life-long fascination with form and color, and his even greater fascination with Israeli society, in 1998 Dov enrolled in the Graphic Design department of the Bezalel Academy of Art & Design in Jerusalem.
Upon graduation in 2002, Dov opened an independent design studio in Jerusalem, where he and his team explore the tensions in form, color, language and type in modern Jewish & Israeli society. His clients include the Avi Chai Foundation, Gesher, PresenTense, and independent musicians such as Ofer Golany and Yoram Getzler.
In his studio, Dov combines classic graphic design work (for clients) with independent artistic work that deals with Jewish and Israeli identity. Dov’s innovative projects have been recognized internationally and have been featured and published in Zeek Magazine, Forward, Maariv, Haaretz and Makor Rishon. His art has been on exhibit at The Jewish Museum in New York as well as at Israel Museum in Jerusalem.
Selected Group Exhibits
2009 - Symmetry, Black Church Print Studio, Dublin, Ireland
2008 - Broken Vessels, The Leiber Center, Bar Ilan University
2007 - Ritual Repetition, The Jewish Museum, NY
2007 - One and All, The Artists’ House, Jerusalem
2007 - Tolerance of Belief, Black Walnut Gallery, Chicago
2006 - Lights, Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Ner Mitzvah (Candle of Commandment)
“For the commandment is a candle / The Torah is a light” - Proverbs 6:23.
Since the Gaonic period, the 613 commandments that the people of Israel were commanded at Sinai are found in the form of various lists which contain directives replete with glory and splendor (“I am the Lord your God”), prohibitions which seem integrated in man’s soul and in the ethics of mankind (“You shall not murder”), laws which if not odd, are at least not self-explanatory (“Let them serve as a symbol on your forehead”) and everyday matters (“You should make a railing for your roof”).
Ner Mitzvah offers a graphic alternative to a list of commandments and presents the commandments not only as spirit but as matter – albeit illuminating matter. A uniform series of the 613 commandments, which at first glance seems straight off an assembly line, the only distinction being individual labels. A closer look reveals that each label has icons that classify the commandments according to type, like washing instructions on clothing. Upon whom is the commandment incumbent? Where and in what time is it in force? What is the punishment for transgression?
The piece raises questions concerning the connections between the commandments, what separates them and what unites them, the choice to deconstruct a Torah of life into 613 items, and how the observer sees himself vis-a-vis this structure of light and matter.
Ner Mitzvah • 613 Yahrtzeit Candles (Wax and Aluminum) • Labels Digitally Printed on Paper • Total Dimensions: 50x200x100cm
Do We Have a Minyan?
The sexton stands outside the door of the synagogue, in the city street, and asks each passer-by if he has recited the Afternoon or Evening Service. He does this, not to satisfy his curiosity, nor to take a survey on the prayer habits of the denizens of his city. Rather, he wants to assemble a minyan, ten male Jews above the age of thirteen, the quorum required to recite the public congregational prayers—barchu, kaddish, kedushah. He gathers the people, one by one, and begins to count. But he does not count “One, two, three,” for fear of the Evil Eye, as is found regarding King David, who refrained from counting the Jewish people by means of ordinary numbers. Rather, the sexton points in turn to each of the people he has gathered: “Save”—“Your”— “People,” echoing the majestic and prayerful verse in Psalms 28:9, "Save Your People, and bless Your heritage, tend them and elevate them forever,” which, in the original Hebrew, contains ten words, equivalent to the number required for a minyan.
He counts, not with mundane numbers, but with holy words. When the sexton has finally collected “forever” (the tenth person), only then do the ten worshippers break out in prayer to God on high. The piece Do We Have a Minyan? suggests an alternative minyan, more heterogeneous and less selective. In this work, ten very different individuals are assembled, who, together, comprise the prayer quorum.
The work examines the tension between the vast universalism of the Biblical verse which is used — “Save Your People,” all of them, great and small, male and female, kippah-wearer and bareheaded Jew—and the selectivity which characterizes that sexton, as the tries to gather his minyan. Are the diverse people in the photographs suitable to form a minyan? Are they eligible for the salvation that we all desire? In short, “Do we have a Minyan?”
Do We Have a Minyan? • 10 Digital Photographs • 20x30 cm each • Lambda Print
Vidduy (The Musical)
A Jewish traveler coming to a congregation just before Rosh Hashana inquired who leads
their prayers on the Days of Awe. They answered him, “There is a carpenter among us who
leads the prayers.” The Jew asked, “How does he lead the prayers?” They said, “He chants
all of the confessional prayers in a joyous melody.” The Jew found the carpenter and asked
him, “Why do you sing the confession with joy?” He answered, “When a man breaks a
valuable vessel, it is common for him to sing joyfully while engaged in its repair, as there is
nothing quite like the wonderful joy of repair.”
Vidduy (The Musical) proposes a physical embodiment of the principal tool given by Jewish Tradition designed to repair the rupture that is sin – the vidduy (literally Confession).
Vidduy (The Musical) is a musical instrument made of 22 white keys engraved with the vidduy zuta (Small Confession) composed by Rav Amram Gaon in the 9th century.
Alphabetically listed, written in plural (“We Have Sinned”), the Vidduy is recited daily, usually hurriedly, on most days of the year – but it is on Yom Kippur that this prayer takes center stage – sung, in many communities, in a tune that fuses subservience, happiness and a splash of relief.
The instrument is played in a manner that brings to mind the beating of the fist on the heart – the gesture that accompanies the Vidduy – hopefully producing a melody that reflects the wonderful joy of repair.
Vidduy (The Musical) • Aluminum, Wood and Rubber • 140 x 40 cm
Shaot Zmaniyot (Temporary Hours)
In the Jewish Halacha, Shaot Zmaniyot (literally means “relative hours”, but can be translated “temporary hours” as a play-on-words) are relative hours, the length of which change according to the season of the year, depending on the duration of daylight on the specific day. According to this calculation, the time between sunrise and sunset is divided by twelve, each fraction considered an Halachic hour. In this way, an Halachic hour in the summer can be longer than 60 minutes, and in the winter it is usually shorter than a conventional clock hour.
These Shaot Zmanyiot have extremely important applications in the life of the Halachic Jew, instructing him or her when to pray, recite the Shma, don Tefillin, or stop eating Chametz on the eve of Passover.
The piece Shaot Zmaniyot presents a visual expression of this, and tries to provoke thought regarding the labeling and categorization of nature, for the practical-Halachic use of keeping the Mitzvot.
Shaot Zmaniyot • Digital Print on Paper • Two Vertical Strips, 45cm x 148cm (17.7” x 58.2”) each
Shoah: a Table of Elements
A piece that deals with the remembrance of the Shoah (Holocaust) using the format of the Chemical Periodic Table of Elements.
Shoah: a Table of Elements • Digital Print on Paper • 50x70 cm
H
Hm Gs
EnMe
Hitler
Table of ElementsThe Shoah of European Jewry 1939–1945
Himmler Goebbels
EichmannMengele
Wb
Tk Bb Mk Sb Bw
GgGöring
AsSpeer
Notable Nazis
Communities Destroyed Partially or Totally
Notable Shoah Films
Notable Shoah Books
Notable Shoah Survivors
Notable Shoah Victims
Notable Concentration/Extermination Camps
Righteous Among the Nations
Asmena Pinsk BiałystokZhetel Vilnius Kiev Tarnopol Budapest Mezhirichi Poznań
Rovno
RhHess
Auschwitz TreblinkaBergen-Belsen Majdanek Sobibor Buchenwald
RpRibbentrop Warsaw Saloniki Kraków MunkatchNowy SączGrodnoLublin Konin
HdHeidrich Frankfurt Berlin Breslav Chełm Dobrzyn Nowogrodek Łódź Prague
Du Ch Bz MnTt
GhGoeth
RgRosenberg Kotsk LipnoLvov Mir
LyLey
Aa Pk Vi
Wr Sk Kw VkVitebsk
Ln
Kv
Lr SrSatmarLudmir
Ff Bn Bv Cm Dz
Tl
Go
Os
Bk Bp Mz
MuSz Ro
Pn
Nk
Kn
Kk Lv Lo
Lz Pg
Mr
Bk
Es
Lb
Sl
Sh
Jl
Pn Ee An
AaAharon
AppelfeldSimon
WiesenthalTommy Lapid
Viktor Frankl
Elie Wiesel
Janusz Korczak
Simon Dubnow
Shimon Shkop
Raoul Wallenberg
Oskar Schindler
JanKarski
Nicholas Winton
Nicolaus Rossini
Victor BodsonJaap Penraat
Wilm Hosenfeld Varian Fry
Albert Göring
Paul Grüninger Frank FoleyCarl Lutz
Abba KovnerAzriel
Rabinowitz
Yisrael Meir Lau
Schindler'sList
Jakob the Liar
Eichmann in Jerusalem
The PianistEuropa Europa
Maus
Life isBeautiful
Survival In Auschwitz
Joel Teitelbaum
Escape from Sobibor
Night
Shoah AmenPrimo Levi
Walter Benjamin
Itzhak Katzenelson
Ephraim Kishon K. Tzetnik
Sw Ew
Ek
Tl Vf
Kz Ak
LkLeo Baeck
Jt
Yl
Pl
AfThe Diary of a Young
Girl
Ng Sa
Ms Ej
Jc Pz
Zl
Jk Cl Nw Nr UmUku Masing
Jp Vb Wh Vf Ag Pg Fy
Sd
Ar
Sp
Ik
Jk
Au
RwDachau Chelmno Belzec Birkenau Theresienstadt Jasenovac Płaszów Mauthausen
Shabbat Shirt
It was a Shabbat Shirt that chipped the first crack in my Orthodoxy. Not that anyone could have predicted that my reluctance to wear a collared white shirt at the age of fifteen would lead to many internal (and external) changes years later – but still, in hindsight at least, it all started with the Shabbat Shirt.
My parents were officially worried. Why is he wearing his weekday shirt on Shabbat? Why is he wearing that blue Kippa to services on Friday Night? And those pants, aren’t they the ones he wore last Wednesday?
And I, and not in a spiteful way, I might add – was doing my own thing. Playing little games between me and myself. Wearing a white shirt on Sunday. Putting on my Shabbat Shoes on Friday just until sundown, and then changing to sandals. Little exercises in the seam between holy and mundane.
For many years I could not get myself to wear the canonical White Shabbat Shirt on Shabbat. When need be I found creative, yet distinctive, alternatives: a white tennis shirt (those “in the loop” know that these can never be considered “official” Shabbat Shirts), white collared shirts with subtle Japanese prints, or a mickey mouse logo. I refused to wear the uniform.
In recent years, I take the Shabbat Shirt off its hanger once a year – on Yom Kippur. I believe that it’s not such a bad thing to have one day a year wear we put are over-sophistication and ego aside, and just get into line. Last Yom Kippur I even added a matching standard White Kippa on my head.
Shabbat Shirt • Acrylic on Canvas • 60x80 cm
The Baseball Field of Life
The uncanny similarity in shape between the baseball diamond and the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, which has been pointed out before, is what sparked the idea for this work, but the similarities do not end only in form.
While the Tree of Life, or Etz haChayim (עץ החיים) in Hebrew, is a mystical symbol used to understand the nature of God and the manner in which He created the world, it also depicts a “map” of Creation. It details the various spiritual elements of the world that surrounds us.
To the true baseball fan, concepts such as beauty, splendor, strength and wisdom are just as much a part of the game as the sacrifice fly or the seventh inning stretch. These spiritual entities are present in every facet of the game, and they stand as a microcosm of our life experience, enriched and fulfilled.
The Baseball Field of Life • Digital Print on Paper • 35x70 cm
Gan Eden / Gehinom (Heaven / Hell)
One of my rabbi’s favorite stories in yeshiva, was about the student who asked the rabbi:
“Rebbe, what does Olam Haba (the next world) look like?”
The rabbi thought for a moment, and replied: “Olam Haba? Olam Haba is nothing but a shtender (a lectern often used in Yeshiva study). When you enter Olam Haba you are given a gemarah (The book of the Talmud). If in this life you have acquired the love for learning Torah, then the shtender is Gan Eden (heaven) – but if, G-d forbid you did not, then that same shtender is no less than the Gehinom (Hell).
The piece Gan Eden / Gehinom visualizes this notion that may stick with an individual who has since departed from the Beit Midrash, but secretly still wonders if in fact the Olam Haba is nothing but a shtender.
Gan Eden / Gehinom (Heaven / Hell) • Digital Print on Paper • 20x30 cm
As for Ishmael • Digital Print on Paper • 45x45 cm V’Lo Tchonem • Digital Print on Paper • 45x45 cm
Assorted Work
Sukkah Ba’ir (Sukkah in the City) • Digital Print on Paper • 60x80 cm A Time to Destroy • Digital Print on Paper • 50x50 cm
The Cheftza Project (Objects in Service of Halacha) • Web project :: www.cheftza.net
The Zimna Project (the Halachic Calendar) • Web project :: www.zimna.net (coming soon)
Days that Tefillin are Not Donned
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
Tishrei
Cheshvan
Kislev
Tevet
Shvat
Adar
Nissan
Iyar
Sivan
Tammuz
Av
Elul
