The Philadelphia Shul/Church Project | 2016
The Philadelphia Shul/Church Project project comprises two main elements: works on paper that document the buildings from a variety of viewpoints, and an audio collage created with sound recorded during services at Jewish and Christian congregations with shared history.
You can listen to This Is Our Story, the audio piece that accompanies the visual work, by following this link and then returning to view the images.
My intention for this project is to depict both the past and present use of these spaces, in order to encourage curiosity and insight into the history, current reality, and potential for connection between Jewish and Black communities. Embedded in these works are the echoes of the White Flight of the 1950’s-80’s, during which urban Jews moved to the suburbs as black populations were increasing in city neighborhoods. These works acknowledge both the anti-Semitism and racism that Jewish and Black communities have struggled with, and the beauty and strength of the congregations that share the history of these buildings and neighborhoods.
