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November 7, 2008
Artist trio makes Echoes together
Gallery exhibit features work that hopefully will foster dialogue and different worldviews.
OLGA LIVSHIN
Three women, three cultures, three distinct artistic personalities – together they created the exhibition Echoes, which opened last week at the Sidney and Gertrude Zack Gallery, in the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver (JCCGV).
Sidi Schaffer, Devora and Sorour Abdollahi are friends, as well as collaborators in art. Schaffer is the most experienced of them. Born in Romania, she suffered from the Holocaust as a child, but it didn't make her bitter or scared. Kind and sweet, she keeps her heart open to the universe, inviting everyone to share her friendship and her smile. When she lived in Israel, she was an art teacher for 14 years, instructing youngsters in the mysteries of art and generosity.
Schaffer's work reflects her personality: brave, giving and imaginative. "My freedom lies in my imagination," she says in her artistic statement.
A couple of Schaffer's paintings represent an earlier period in her art, characterized by bold brush strokes and a tendency to the abstract. "I liked to paint on the floor then," she recalled. One such piece is "Dancing in his Feathers." It resembles the flight of a bird, unfettered, striving for self-expression.
The other canvasses are more modern, and each one tells a story. The hero of "Solo" is a New York street musician, lost in his flute. "I took his photo and promised him it would become a painting," said Schaffer. The white light behind the flutist shimmers with his unearthly music. Next to it, "Vibrance and Tranquillity" is a juxtaposition of two different landscapes Schaffer encountered in Jaffa. Like in real life, the tranquillity of the indigo stairway and the vibrancy of a sun-drenched little street co-exist in her painting, stretching the bond between the artist and her beloved land of Israel. Also connected to Israel, "B'reishit – In the Beginning" is a turquoise abstract, boasting a scroll of Torah. Its unrolling Hebrew writing tinkles like a joyful waterfall, transparent and life affirming.
The second artist of the show, Devora, met Schaffer 10 years ago, during the Gesher Project. Designed for survivors, child survivors and the second generation of the victims of the Holocaust, Gesher brought together people from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, helping them to overcome their emotional traumas through art.
A fiercely private person, Devora is unwilling to share her real name with strangers. Instead, she has taken her grandmother's name, Devora, as an alias of her creative self. "My grandmother was murdered ... during the Shoah," she explained. "Her spirit gives me strength to do what I want to do but am scared of – she gives me the strength to create."
Devora regards Schaffer as her mentor in art. "I'm influenced by a convergence of themes," she said, "darkness and death, catastrophe and trauma, loss and displacement, lack of belonging.... I rejoice in the impulse to reach for the light ... and in the ability to trust and love." An intuitive artist, Devora said she only feels whole when she paints. She employs free associations in her paintings and she also writes poetry. Two of her paintings have poems imbedded in them.
"Sauce" is a piece with double meaning. While its innocuous title and red palette suggest a splotch of ketchup, the poem draws on the images of blood, pogroms and death. The only commonality between the two meanings is the color red. "Imprint" and its poem reflect Devora's memory of her mother, hinting at the deep, hidden wounds of the Holocaust. "I work without the critic," she said. "When finished, I step back in silence and give space for the work to speak."
Devora met Abdollahi at the Emily Carr Institute, where they both took classes. Later, she introduced Abdollahi to Schaffer, and all three women became friends. Abdollahi said, "In my friendship and collaboration with Sidi and Devora, I see an opportunity to explore and express my own culture, but also to relate these themes to other cultural experiences, recognizing the echoes of each other in our works and our lives."
Abdollahi is perhaps an unusual artist to include in a display at the JCCGV, as she is Iranian. Like her friends though, she has gone through traumas and other hardships in her life, including war and her recent immigration to Canada. In her art, Abdollahi bridges past and present, creates a visual amalgam of what was before and what is yet to come. The rich cultural landscape of Persia injects a note of nostalgia into her paintings of ancient ruins, a repeated motif of her art. "Layered Walls" and "Urban Space" radiate her love for the country she left behind, while "Traces" and "Breaking Apart" are artistic representations of the contemporary enmeshed with the old, modern architecture opening a door into the past. "History is like a weight on my shoulders, but I like it," the artist confessed.
Abdollahi thinks that many grim realities of today result from the artificial borders between nations. She hopes that the exhibits of Echoes "... create an interesting dialogue and negotiation process, which hopefully provides the viewer a different view of the world – one which is borderless, free and peaceful."
Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer.
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