{"id":18341,"date":"2016-04-15T01:28:09","date_gmt":"2016-04-15T08:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=18341"},"modified":"2016-04-13T12:21:22","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T19:21:22","slug":"interpreting-torah-with-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2016\/04\/15\/interpreting-torah-with-art\/","title":{"rendered":"Interpreting Torah with art"},"content":{"rendered":"

Artists Nancy Current, left, and Robin Atlas at Zack Gallery. (photo by Linda Lando)<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Visual Midrash: Plagues and Visions, which opened at Zack Gallery on April 7, features the work of Seattleites Robin Atlas and Nancy Current, the only West Coast artists creating in the genre of visual midrash. The show is the culmination of a four-year collaboration that started in 2012.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe met through the Jewish Art Salon in New York,\u201d said Current. \u201cEven though we both live in Seattle, we didn\u2019t know each other at that point.\u201d<\/p>\n

Atlas elaborated: \u201cThe president of the Jewish Art Salon sent us both an introductory email. She said we probably knew each other already, but we didn\u2019t \u2013 and we lived only 10 minutes apart.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRobin was about to open a new show in L.A. and she brought her works to my studio,\u201d said Current. \u201cI was amazed. There was so much beauty and thought behind it all. That\u2019s what visual midrash is all about. It requires two elements: the clarity of story and the visual beauty of the artist\u2019s interpretation. I looked at Robin\u2019s art and I said to myself, I\u2019m going to work with her forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

They started working together, but their chosen genre \u2013 interpreting Torah through visual art \u2013 is not widely known. \u201cWe didn\u2019t have a ready audience in the West,\u201d Current explained, \u201cnot like in New York. We needed to build it, so we started teaching adult classes two years ago. The classes include the texts from the Torah, introduced by a Torah instructor, and a visual component, taught by an art instructor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would do slide shows, video presentations, and the students would have a chance to create their own art,\u201d Atlas said. \u201cLinda Lando, the Zack Gallery director, facilitated the first class we did in Vancouver earlier this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the current show, the artists explored the theme of the 10 plagues. \u201cWe were drawn to the story,\u201d said Current.<\/p>\n

Although each artist works with different media \u2013 Atlas with textiles and Current with glass and paper \u2013 their creative vision is similar. Their symbolic abstracts mesh extremely well, as if the images belong together, buzzing with the same esthetic sense and the same muted elegance, complementing each other to tell the same tale.<\/p>\n

While the Vancouver Jewish community was introduced to Atlas when she exhibited at the Zack in mid-2014, Current is a new name for most local art appreciators.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always drew and painted as a child but I can\u2019t say that I had the conscious idea to be an artist,\u201d Current recalled. \u201cI grew up in Seattle, in an old house with stained-glass windows. That undoubtedly affected my later fascination with glass. I learned to blow glass when I was about 24, but gave that up in favor of painting on stained-glass.\u201d<\/p>\n

She explained, \u201cGlass is different from other mediums because light passes through it (transmitted light) instead of bouncing off [of it], like with paper or canvas (reflected light). Transmitted light, especially through colored glass, connects to a person\u2019s emotional centre more directly than reflected light. It also has a spiritual aspect. Think of all those stained-glass windows in churches and synagogues. That is important to my Jewish work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although she has worked in other visual genres, Jewish themes absorb her artistic passion now.<\/p>\n

\u201cJewish art has gradually replaced my other work, life drawing and landscape, because it is much more meaningful,\u201d she said. \u201cVisual midrash is the most meaningful Jewish art of all. It requires a lot of study and thought, and those are things I highly value about living a Jewish life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Current pointed to two particular influences on her development as an artist.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first was studying at Pilchuck Glass School,\u201d she said. \u201cThe school attracted many artists early in the history of the American studio glass movement. I studied there with the amazing British glass painter Patrick Reyntiens. He is 90 years old now and still a good friend.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second was finding the Jewish Art Salon (JAS) in New York. Becoming a fellow in the JAS has led me to friendships with several Jewish artists who have been doing visual midrash for years. They have helped a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Current doesn\u2019t concentrate on making a living with her art. Her main concern is to share it with as many people as possible. \u201cOf course, eventually I want to sell my work,\u201d she said, \u201cbut not until I\u2019ve had a chance to show it in several exhibitions. The purpose of doing my work is to cause people to think about their Jewish heritage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Current and Atlas\u2019 show runs until May 8.<\/p>\n

Olga Livshin<\/strong> is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at olgagodim@gmail.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Artists Nancy Current, left, and Robin Atlas at Zack Gallery. (photo by Linda Lando) Visual Midrash: Plagues and Visions, which opened at Zack Gallery on April 7, features the work of Seattleites Robin Atlas and Nancy Current, the only West Coast artists creating in the genre of visual midrash. The show is the culmination of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18321,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[989],"tags":[5655,1260,5654,40],"class_list":["post-18341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-visual-arts","tag-nancy-current","tag-robin-atlas","tag-visual-midrash","tag-zack-gallery"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18341\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}