Derfner Judaica Museum + The Art Collection at Hebrew Home at Riverdale is pleased to announce Jerusalem Between Heaven and Earth, jointly organized with the Jewish Art Salon and guest curator Ori Z. Soltes for the 2017 Jerusalem Biennale, which will be on view at the Derfner Judaica Museum from January 28–May 27, 2018. A reception and talk will take place from 1:30–3 p.m. on Sunday, January 28, 2018, at the Museum, located at 5901 Palisade Avenue in the Riverdale section of The Bronx. This exhibition is free and open to the public. R.S.V.P. 718.581.1596 or [email protected]. Photo I.D. required for entry at all times.

The Jewish Art Salon’s exhibition was one of 26 exhibitions and projects from around the world that occupied multiple venues in Jerusalem this past fall. The Derfner Judaica Museum is honored to bring this exhibition to New York for its only US showing. Jerusalem Between Heaven and Earth includes 34 works by 30 artists who explore this year’s Biennale theme of “watershed.” According to Ram Ozeri, its Director and Founder, “The Jerusalem Biennale provides a stage for professional artists—from secular to ultra-Orthodox—who refer in their artwork to Jewish thought, spirit, tradition or experience.” The recent Biennale threw “a spotlight onto the concept of watershed, examining it from a literal, metaphorical and even historical perspective,” he elaborated. “The theme finds its expression in issues as varied as Jewish identity, immigration and refugees, alongside watershed moments in history. . . . Both in Hebrew (kav parashat hamayim) and in English, watershed is used to describe an important turning point—an event that changed the course of history.”

Ori Z. Soltes has taken the watershed theme and interpreted it with his selection of works by artists from the US, Israel, the UK and the Netherlands. According to Soltes, “A watershed yields a branching, be it of physical terrain, historical events or spiritual and aesthetic concepts. Such an idea is particularly powerful in conjunction with the city of Jerusalem” where “the spiritual foundations. . . branch in three Abrahamic directions. . . .”

Watershed ideas extend from Jerusalem’s topography to moments that shape history and thought—to contemporary aesthetics and politics. In the exhibition, paintings by Tobi Kahn and a video by Leah Caroline and Jeremy S-Horseman offer abstract suggestions of the geological watershed that helps define Jerusalem. In her video, Sarah Lightman turns that topography inward toward life’s profound watershed moments.