Inspiring Connections #2

To purchase tickets – 9.6.2021

Duration: 90 min. without intermission

No One Should Die

Yair Dalal Following Rafi Bukai’s film “Avanti Popolo”
Released in 1986, “Avanti Popolo” quickly became a milestone in the chronicles of Israeli cinema, thanks to its complex, original, and unapologetic look at the Israeli-Arab conflict. Set at the end of the 67 War, the plot centers on two stranded Egyptian privates who wander through the Sinai Desert, trying to cross the Suez Canal and make their way home. The film blurs the boundaries of identity and belonging, and shines a light on humanity and the desire for life in the face of mindless and inconceivable death.
Yair Dalal, who has been initiating collaborations and building an intercultural bridge between Arab and Jewish musicians for years, first watched “Avanti Popolo” when it was originally released. The film left a strong impression on him and now, 35 years later, he presents “No One Should Die” inspired by the film – an original new musical piece that echoes the cry of the Egyptian solider, masterfully portrayed by Salim Dau. Like the film, “No One Should Die” celebrates peace, honors life, and rejects any justification of war and death.

You are IT

Echo Following Yochai Matos’s installation “You Are a Saint”
In this new original work, one of the most prominent female voices in the Israeli hip hop scene, Echo draws inspiration from Yochai Matos’s “You Are a Saint” light installation.
As the name of Matos’s work suggests, sitting underneath its halo-airplane of neon tubes and taking a picture, the accidental viewer undergoes transformation into a saint. Following Matos, Echo expresses for the first time what she felt for years on stage – that the audience is an inseparable part of the artwork.
“You are IT” is an audience participation electronic audiovisual urban ritual. In this original collaborative sound work, the hall becomes a studio and the audience becomes a live choir.

Light artist: Yoav Barel / Music: Echo & Michael Guy / Sound: Dadi Nada

My Father / My Daughter

Amir and Daniel Kolben Following Asad Azi’s painting “My Father is a Soldier”
In 1961, during his military service, Asad Azi’s father was killed by a Syrian sniper. Years later, as a mature artist he returns to the figure of his father in military uniform, standing tall in what looks like a typical military base. Azi repeatedly duplicated the figure of the father-soldier, as if to preserve a fading memory. Bearing no national markers, the figure in Azi’s painting underscores the triviality of death and emphasizes the complexity of his sense of belonging/not-belonging in the face of local, political, and social reality of the Druze community in Israel.
The preoccupation with the father figure in Azi’s body of work is the backdrop to a new piece by choreographer Amir Kolben and his daughter, the musician Daniel Kolben. The two will perform side by side, and create a space for mourning and longing. Tied to one another by an invisible rope, they will explore the abandonment, disintegration, and downfall of the powerful father myth, and touch on the humanity and fragility of the father-daughter relationship.
Music and singing: Danielle Kolben / Choreography: Amir Kolben / Music Producer: Oren Sela

Lanua

Rina Schenfeld Inspired by Michal Rovner’s video works
Rina Schenfeld has been choreographing and dancing for over 50 years. A pioneer of the Israeli dance scene, her work seems timeless. In this new solo, she once again returns to video in a dance inspired by Michal Rovner’s video art.
Video art allows Schenfeld to leave the confines of the studio. Her body reflects Rovner’s works, assimilates into them, and engages in a dynamic dialogue with them. The letters and symbols from Rovner’s work transport Schenfeld into faraway worlds, and when her own body also becomes a series of symbols, it expresses in movement what cannot be put into words.
“Lanua” is a manifestation of body movement that has no end, which captures inside it the past, present, and future.
Dancer and Choreographer: Rina Schenfeld / Video: Michal Rovner / Costumes: Sasson Kedem / Music: KHalf Noise by Múm

Delicate Frame for a Broken Heart

Dalia Shimko Following the poet Nathan Zach
Actor and director Dalia Shimko returns to three poems from Nathan Zach’s “First Poems” – the first poetry book she ever bought. Zach’s three poems about separations form a delicate frame for a private heartbreak. Accompanied by live original music by the bass player and former member of The Witches Ifat Netz, Shimko entwines Zach’s texts with heart wrenching personal excerpts that bring to life the psyche and existential abyss of her breakup with her partner of 11 years.
Poems by Nathan Zach / Written, directed & performed by Dalia Shimko / Original music, bass guitar, arrangements and musical production: Ifat Netz / SPD, programmer, electric guitar, arrangements: Shely Tal / Percussions: Dana Barlev Costume Design: Liron Paniel / Thank you to Omer
Shemer

The Gypsy and the Child

Nava Zuckerman Following the late Talia Shapira
“The Gypsy and the Child” is a collaborative work by director Nava Zuckerman and her close friend and co-creator, the late actor, comic, and singer Talia Shapira. Zuckerman and Shapira worked together and inspired one another over a decade, until Shapira’s passing in 1992. Now, almost three decades later, they reunite.
“The Gypsy and the Child” is a short, handwritten text that Shapira’s son found in one of her notebooks. When Zuckerman saw the text – lean and concise, perhaps a synopsis, or the start of a script or a play – she immediately realized that the gypsy is in fact Shapira, an eternal free-spirited nomad, forever holding her son’s hand. Zuckerman stages one last joint show with Shapira’s text, wishing to address her own – and perhaps also Shapira’s – conflict between motherhood and art.
Created by Nava Zuckerman and the late Talia Shapira / Music and actor: Eyal Shechter / Violin and co-creator: Arik Kneller/ Visual: Yoni Ben Tovim / Video editing and on stage cinematography: Naomi Baniel / Lighting design: Matan Preminger / Live Video: Erez Schwarzbaum

Amphi

Omer Krieger Following a dance choreographed by the late Noa Eshkol for the “Decade” memorial ceremony
In 1953, choreographer Noa Eshkol was invited by the United Kibbutz Movement to compose a dance for a memorial ceremony marking a decade to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Based on a silent 4-minute film, the only moving documentation of the avant-garde piece as it was performed at Kibbutz Lohamei Hageta’ot, artist Omer Krieger created a new performance, reconstructing and expanding the original, followed by a video and light installation for the Rebecca Crown Hall of the Jerusalem Theatre.
Kriger’s return to Eshkol’s work conjures longing for the time when new and groundbreaking art was integrated in civil ceremonies, wondering if and where today’s crowded cities allow for such official and informal social and artistic gathering.
“Amphi” is a gentle reflection on the physical and spiritual intersections of art, society, and state.
Concept, direction, new choreography: Omer Krieger / Producer: Yael Cohen / Dancers: Tamar Even-Chen, Dror Birger, Sheer Sivan, Nunzia Piccialo, Mishel Shalha / Music: Shushan / Costumes and art director: Netta Dror / Dramaturgy: Florian Malzacher / Rehearsal manager: Karmit Burian / Reconstruction of the 1953 dance done in collaboration with Ruti Sela and Mor Bashan, the Noa Eshkol Foundation for Movement Notation / Camera: Daniel Miller / Video editing: Nir Evron / Color: Yoni Passi / Sound design: Binya Reches / Produced by MARCEL art projects, artistic director Adi Englman / Supported by Goethe Institute – International Coproduction Fund The Israel Lottery Council For Culture & Art / In collaboration with the Noa Eshkol Foundation for Movement Notation, The Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum, 1:1 Center for Art and Politics

Tomorrow

Ronny Someck Following the Bashir Abu Rabi’a’s painting “Lone Ranger”
Born into the Abu Rabia Bedouin tribe in the Negev, Bashir Abu Rabi’a’s paintings expose the tribe’s culture and daily life with sharp abstract brushstrokes. Alongside his painting practice, Abu Rabi’a has also been working as a special effects artist and art director on Israeli and Hollywood film productions.
Poet Ronny Someck and Bashir Abu Rabi’a met in the late 1970s at the mythological bohemian Café Kassit, and discovered their shared love of the iconic Japanese film director Akira Kurosawa. Someck wrote the poem “Tomorrow” about Rabi’a’s new painting “Lone Ranger,” which took him back to the sharp movements of the samurai in Kurosawa’s legendary film “The Seven Samurai.”
Armed with his own sword – a sword of words – Ronny Someck will meet his longtime friend Abu Rabi’a on stage, bridging the distance between the Negev, Tel Aviv, Japan, and Hollywood.
Brushes: Bashir Abu Rabi’a / Words: Ronny Someck / Translation into Arabic: Idan Barir / Inspiration: Akira Kurosawa