Four for Mark
Sloan, Director and Senior Curator, Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art at
the College of Charleston
1.
You were on the
curators’ delegation to Israel with your peers and colleagues from the US. Can you
describe that experience?
It was my first time to Israel and
it was an overwhelming experience for me and my colleagues. We didn’t know what
to expect. Traveling to a country like [Israel] with such a complex, layered
history, one tends to build up images in their mind. Growing up as a Protestant,
I had the Bible images in my head. When I got there I saw something very
different. I was very impressed by the country and the kindness of the people. I
thought the quality of art was very high and exceptional. We also saw a dance
troupe that was incredible. We were certainly never bored.
2.
That delegation is
what led you to Ya’akov Israel. What piqued your interest with this particular
artist?
We saw many artists, museums, and spaces
in the country, but when we went to the building where [Ya’akov] Israel has his
studio, we were unleashed for a few hours to see the six or so artists in that
space. I saw Israel second and I didn’t go anywhere after. My background is
photo curation so it was familiar turf to me. I also recognized his work. I had
seen it submitted to Critical
Mass, a project of Photolucida
out of Portland. They get about 600 or so applicants and about 150 are chosen. It
is all done digitally from one’s desktop for photo curators to see.
He [Israel] submitted the very work
hanging in my gallery now. It was familiar when I saw it in Israel. The work
was already familiar to me and I loved it even more when I saw some of the
original prints. Arranging to bring some of the work was slightly more
complicated than one would think. He had very specific ideas about how he
wanted it displayed. We paid for that work to be done in Israel with the
assistance of the Consulate and it was shipped through diplomatic mail. My staff
was very interested to see that each of the crates had the Israeli seal on it. Yaakov
and I had a series of Skype interviews where we discussed the details. I introduced
him to a writer, Dr. Mark Long, a political geographer to help to unlock the
meaning behind it and they had a series of skype interviews about it. [Read Dr. Long's analysis here.]
3.
How do you think his
work will resonate with people in Charleston/South Carolina/the South in
general? Or the U.S. in general?
Charleston has a very rich Jewish
history. In 1800, there were more Jews in Charleston than the rest of the
colonies combined, so it has a very active, large Jewish population. There is a
book called A Portion of the People by Dale Rosengarten, published by the
University of South Carolina Press. The book is about the rich history and the
thriving Jewish business district in Charleston. Several of the businesses are
still Jewish owned and operated; they may be different businesses but the same families
still own them. Charleston is also the birthplace of Reform Judaism. He’s [Israel]
coming to a very warm welcoming community with a familiarity that might not be
the same in other cities. He’ll be welcomed with a warm embrace. Photography here
is very well-received. The news out of Israel creates a complicated background,
but his work is apolitical. He does not take sides. Even though there are
images of IDF soldiers and a Palestinian on a donkey, there’s no valuation. Everyone
is just a person.
Isn’t that interesting—that this show
covering all of contemporary Israel for the past 10 years has no political
slant? It could have been done by any number of people. It’s human. To me, that’s
what defines Yaakov Israel. He is a humanist. He has incredible compassion for
his fellow man and that’s evident in the way his subjects stare back at him in
his work. There is respect.
4.
Do you see future
opportunities for collaboration with Israel? Anything in the works?
This is Yaakov’s first time showing in
the United States. I took it upon myself to introduce him to a number of my
colleagues in New York and we’re flying him there after the exhibit for a
number of meetings.
We are also traveling the show. So far, we
have one booked at Depauw University in Indiana.