Jerusalem-USA: Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama; 5,951 miles from Jerusalem, Israel; 167 miles from Jerusalem, Alabama; or 0 Cybermiles

17 September 2019

Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama; 5,951 miles from Jerusalem, Israel; 167 miles from Jerusalem, Alabama; or 0 Cybermiles

As a digital homage to Rembrandt on the 350th anniversary of his death, artist Mel Alexenberg is launching cyberangels from Land of Israel, the setting of Rembrandt's Bible themed artworks, to art museums in the twelve US states that have places named JerUSAlem.

“He had a vision in a dream. A ladder was standing on the ground, its top reaching up towards heaven as Divine angels were going up and down on it.” (Genesis 28:12)

Angels in Jacob’s dream go up from the Land of Israel and go down throughout the world.

Top image: Rembrandt inspired cyberangels arrive from Israel at the café of the Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama in time for lunch. The biblical words for angel and food are spelled with the same four Hebrew letters to teach that angels are spiritual messages arising from everyday life. Perhaps there is spiritual significance that museums that offer art also offer food.

Second image: The cyberangels begin their flight from the Israel Museum's Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem, home of ancient Bible scrolls. They gain momentum by going up from the tallest building in Israel, home of Facebook’s R&D Center, until construction is completed for the 91 story Azrieli Spiral Tower in Tel Aviv with the shape of a Bible scroll.

Third image: Cyberangels spiral up from a NASA satellite image of the Land of Israel on a smartphone screen on Mel Alexenberg’s newest book Through a Bible Lens: Biblical Insights for Smartphone Photography and Social Media. They launch the book throughout the world from the artist/author’s studio in Israel. See praise for the book at Israel365.

Bottom image: Alexenberg’s lithograph “Long Island Angels” in the collection of Birmingham Museum of Art. The Rembrandt inspired cyberangels ascend from the Land of Israel to The Cloud, the network of networks, and come down to link Long Island to Alabama on continental United States.

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Mel Alexenberg

As an artist, my conceptual, environmental, and digital artworks have been seen by millions and are represented in the collections of more than forty museums worldwide. As an educator in USA, I am former art professor at Columbia University, head of the art department at Pratt Institute, dean at New World School of the Arts in Miami, and reseach fellow at MIT's Center for Advanced Visual Studies. In Israel, I taught at Bar-Ilan, Ariel and Tel Aviv universities and at Emunah College and Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. As a writer, my most recent books are: 'Through a Bible Lens: Biblical Insights for Smartphone Photography and Social Media,' 'Photograph God: Creating a Spiritual Blog of Your Life,' 'The Future of Art in a Postdigital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness,' 'Educating Artists for the Future: Learning at the Intersections of Art, Science, Technology, and Culture' and 'Dialogic Art in a Digital World: Judaism and Contemporary Art' (in Hebrew). I live in Ra'anana, Israel, with my wife artist Miriam Benjamin. website: www.melalexenberg.com

Jerusalem-USA

From Jerusalem in Israel to JerUSAlems in USA

'This city of Jerusalem I have set in the midst of nations, with other countries round about her.' (Ezekiel 5:5)

JerUSAlem-USA is a participatory art project that links the twenty Jerusalems in the United States with the original Jerusalem in Israel. There are Jerusalems in Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Maryland, Michigan, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Utah, and Vermont.

The name of the American Jerusalems was inspired by the Bible where we read about King David establishing Jerusalem as the capital of the unified state of the Israelite nation more than 3,000 years ago. Today, Jerusalem is the vibrant capital of the modern State of Israel.

ON PARTICIPATORY ART

JerUSAlem-USA is a participatory artwork in which the artist invites the people in USA join with him in creating a collaborative work of art. Unlike the solitary role of the visual artist in his studio, the role of the artist in a networked world is shifting to becoming more like the role of playwright/producer/director in theater and film, composer/conductor in music and choreographer in dance.

In her book The Reenchantment of Art, Suzi Gablik proposes, “a new paradigm of participation in which art will begin to redefine itself in terms social relatedness…encouraging the emergence of a more participatory, social interactive framework for art, and supporting the transition from art-for-art’s-sake assumptions of late modernism.”

As the artist of ‘JerUSAlem-USA,” I create the conceptual framework, craft the score/script, and form a team of collaborators who together under my baton bring into being an aesthetic work of participatory art.

The significance of participatory art in our networked world is explored in depth in Mel Alexenberg's books Through a Bible Lens: Biblical Insights for Smartphone Photography and Social Media (Elm Hill/HarperCollins), and The Future of Art in a Postdigital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness and Educating Artists for the Future: Learning at the Intersections of Art, Science, Technology and Culture (both published by Intellect Books/University of Chicago Press).