Italian Renaissance, Tel Aviv Style
Graphic by Angelie Zaslavsky
Crossposted from Haaretz
Entering the Tel Aviv studio of artist Lenny Dinar Dothan one encounters hospitality amid charming disorder. Sawdust is scattered everywhere, among the saws, rulers, pencils and books. Propped up against the wall are some of her works, among them a painting in which she is seen nursing her little son against the backdrop of an arch. The classical composition immediately evokes associations with the Florentine school of the Italian Renaissance. Add to this the fact that Dothan works in the Florentin neighborhood of the city — and you have an apt name for her current exhibit — “Florentin,” at the Hahanut Gallery in south Tel Aviv. The tiny exhibition is her first solo one, but the list of Dothan’s activities to date is extraordinarily long and complex.
The same composition is repeated in Dinar Dothan’s video work, “Sleeping Madonna,” in which she is filmed nursing her son as she falls asleep. “I wanted to be a perfect mother,” she says, “but I’m not. I fell asleep. All those utopians,” she says, referring to the new generation of parents. “All of them are in couples therapy. I don’t buy those utopians.”
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
