LABA by Siona Benjamin Four cathedral-scale mixed media panels exploring the journey of the four matriachs as they enter the Pardes. Till all children are safe, none are safe. Mothers will find it within themselves to make everything happen. (Benjamin’s work is on display at the 14th Street Y through the end of March.) Kizoa slideshow:
Elissa Strauss on the Power of Parenthood Becoming a mother didn’t make me nicer. More compassionate? Yes. More sensitive? Sure. But nicer. No. During the few months in which I was “trying”, I started involuntarily responding to pregnant women with a snarl. Then there was the period of time following my son’s birth when my
Ruby Namdar on how motherhood exalted and destroyed the women of Genesis Adriaen van der Werff: “Sarah Presenting Hagar” Motherhood, especially with the first child, is an extremely tender, and hence vulnerable, state. But this extreme state of fragility is also a time in which the visible and invisible structures of power in the family
Tom Block on the Knife’s Edge Between Creation and Destruction Kizoa slideshow: Tom Block – Slideshow Through my nearly three decades as a playwright, author and artist, I have thought deeply about human origins. That moment when Being flared from nothingness. The LABA Fellowship has provided a vessel within which to create a specific work
Nadav Lev on Life in the Children’s House Share Come see Lev perform a brand-new work inspired by the nightwathers of his youth on 1/25 at the 14th Street Y. I was raised on kibbutz in central Israel where I lived, until age 11, in a communal lodging area known as the beit ha’yeladim (children’s
Elissa Strauss on the Majesty of Making Babies Lucas Cranach Share For so long, I took their word for it. Eve — the world’s first woman according to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions — messed up. Her punishment, two-fold. One, she was kicked out of Eden, sweet Eden, where she spent her days sauntering around naked, no shame
Ruby Namdar on Why We Hate Thinking About Our Mothers Having Sex “Maternal Affection” by Edward Hodges Baily (1788-1861) Share How ironic is it that Eve, mother of all living things, is also associated with death and mortality? In the book of Genesis, Eve is portrayed as the weak moral link, the one
Siona Benjamin is a painter originally from Bombay, now living in the US. Her work reflects her background of being brought up Jewish in a predominantly Hindu and Muslim India. In her paintings she combines the imagery of her past with the role she plays in America today, making a mosaic inspired by both Indian
Two Egyptian Grandparents, One Cup of Turkish Coffee by Misha Shulman
On hunger, desire and rock and roll by Stephen Hazan Arnoff http://vevo.ly/eDnhbM Share Ruth lives in the age of Judges. “Joshua Judges Ruth,” the title of a 1992 Lyle Lovett album, aptly summarizes this age by reciting the New Testament order of the books preceding her story as a kind of ancient J’accuse. Early in