What is Jewish Art?
Something I’ve been struggling with since choosing this project is deciding what style I wanted to use. There’s not really such a thing as “Jewish” art or design. I recently came across this comic:
It perfectly explained what I’ve been struggling with. What makes “Jewish art” Jewish? Is it Jewish because I, a Jewish designer, created it? Or is it Jewish because I make it Jewish on purpose? A good point made in the comic is that a group’s culture is largely dependent on its location of origin, but what unifies a group whose origins have been erased? When you spend your whole history running, where do you come from?
While showing my project progress to others, I’ve heard a few times that they know what a “Jewish” cookbook should look like, or that the style I’d chosen was too sterile or not celebratory enough. But I can’t help but think back to this comic because when I think of the way “Jewish” design should look, nothing comes to mind. Because “the only tradition to Jewish art is that there is none.” The Jewish people have survived by adapting to their surroundings, because we never know when it is safe to be identifiably Jewish. So Jewish art reflects the area in which it is created. This book is aimed towards American millennials, and so must be designed with that in mind.
This is also shown in Jewish cuisine, which is the whole point of my book collection. We have picked up recipes and traditions from all over the world, and adapted them. I want to include traditions and recipes from many different areas. My Israeli grandmother’s Moroccan fish recipe being one, and the more traditionally European brisket and rugelach being others. To me, this feels right because I grew up experiencing many different Jewish cultures and traditions in Israel and in the US. But to others, mostly goyim, the content of the books might feel disjointed. But I think that’s what makes it Jewish to me. We are a disjointed and jumbled people, and we always have been.
