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Mission and History

The JAI was originally conceived by the Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles in partnership with the University of Southern California Casden Institute and the USC Roski School of Fine Arts.

Learn about our past and our plans for the future.

Upcoming JAI Sponsored Event: An Evening with Yanai Toister

Yanai Toister is an Israeli artist who primarily photographs architecture in Israel. Yanai's photographs of kibbutz buildings, settlement tract homes and candy colored military sites reveal a multifaceted view of Israel.  His work provokes discussion about Israeli society in a nuanced and thoughtful manner. 

When Yanai speaks he addresses ideas of design and nationhood, Israel's history of design and its support of Israel's social ideal. He can describe the particularity of modern Israeli architecture and its relationship to the high aspirations of the developing Israeli state, thus generating a more complex understanding of Israeli society.

Yanai lives, works and teaches in Tel Aviv, exhibits internationally, and lived in LA for several years. His work has been exhibited at the major art institutions in Israel, including the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel Museum, and Herzliya Museum. He is represented by Sandroni Rey Gallery in Culver City.  He is a graduate of Cal Arts MFA program and earned a BFA the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. 

Otis College of Art and Design invited Yanai to teach in the Graduate Theory Seminar as Visiting Artist Lecturer in the Graphic Design MFA program this July. The Graphic Design program runs for 8 weeks each summer.  Otis has asked Yanai to teach from July 15-22.  He will be in Los Angeles from roughly July 12-26. 

JAI has agreed to partner with Otis and the Jewish Federation becoming one of the organizations sponsoring Yanai's trip this July. In exchange Yanai has offered to give a private talk to the Jewish Artists Initiative. 

SAVE THE DATE: 

JAI Program with Yanai Toister

July 23, 2009  7-9 p.m.

> Location to follow

Judith Margolis: Countdown to Perfection-Meditations on the Sefirot at HUC-JIR/NY Museum

I am still counting. But when you, dear reader, see this, you will have finished, having safely arrived at Matan Torah.  Nonetheless, even if you meditated deeply each and every day, the fact is that we still need to count, and ponder the myriad paths of spiritual elevation that Hashem continues to offer us.  If we could just become a bit more aware of them.  Judith Margolis' Omer Counter, currently exhibited at Hebrew Union College Museum, offers a visual and textual guide into these riches.

This very special Omer counter is a limited edition book of 50 giclee (fine art digital) prints, hand-bound in such a way that every page can be individually displayed.  Each page is numbered by the Hebrew date of counting and features an image by Judith Margolis with text that inspired them.  The text is by Jerusalem-based teacher Sarah Yuhudit Schneider, and explores the seven lower emanations found in the Sefirot, from hesed to malkhut. In turn, each weekday is modified by one of these seven middot, setting up a creative tension between the fundamental aspect of the week and its daily modification.  The result:  the written meditation and the images guide us through exercises in spiritual and ethical behavior, facilitating our deepening connection with G-d through the sefirot.  Like all good art, these pages require study and contemplation in order to allow their fruits to ripen. It is a rewarding journey.

Let me count the ways

Margolis utilizes many different motifs to shape her meanings, deftly combining abstract compositions with figurative symbolic touches.  Repeated throughout the 49 are images of hands, branches, rooted trees, fiery orbs and perhaps most evocatively, snakes.   Each exudes a symbolic meaning that colors the daily sefirah designation and the accompanying daily kavanah.  Day One is Hesed sh'b'Hesed and we see two open hands, equally expressing supplication and giving as they are cupping a Divine fire. The first meditation focuses on unconditional generosity, "the root of all 49 emotional states."  This is the highest of the emanations, closest to the Divine and yet, only the beginning of our journey. 

Day Four, Netzah sh'b'Hesed depicts two hands in a poetic dance of "eternal giving" that feeds the soul.  This notion of hesed, kindness and generosity, sets the tenor of our introspections.  Still within the first week on Day Six we arrive at Yesod sh'b Hesed, uncovering the foundation upon which all our actions should rely. "Giving is the most potent gesture of imitating G-d. It links the Heavens with the Earth."  Suddenly the two oblong circles of blue, just touching and incised with white, the waters above and the waters below, take on a monumental meaning.  What we do down here affects the Divine.  I must guard my action, my thoughts, and my intentions.