The CJM Blog

Thoughts from scribe-in-residence Julie Seltzer on what she's writing, her process, and the experience of writing a Torah on public view. Last year, b’etzem hayom hazeh , on this self-same day, As It Is Written: Project 304,805 opened. Another important event in my life happened on this day as well: sixty-one years ago, on October 8th, 1949, my mother, z”l, was born.

by James G. Leventhal Jaron Lanier came to speak at the Contemporary Jewish Museum as part of the Museum's LINK program,, a Jewish, Art, and Technology initiative at the CJM.

by Dara Solomon, Associate Curator Allan Wexler (American, b. 1949), Gardening Sukkah , 2000, wood, gardening implements, eating utensils. Courtesy of Ronald Feldman Fine Arts, New York. Come see our exhibition Reinventing Ritual: Contemporary Art and Design for Jewish Life which looks at artists exploring Jewish ritual through art and design. The exhibition opened in April 2010 with Passover and closes on October 3, around the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. This exhibition is a great way to contemplate and better understand the High Holy Days.

Thoughts from scribe-in-residence Julie Seltzer on what she's writing, her process, and the experience of writing a Torah on public view. In the gallery, visitors can leave me questions. Many of the questions are about how to deal with mistakes, or about the letters, or offers to help with proofreading (thank you!). Some of the questions are more unusual, and I thought I’d answer a few here.

by Dan Schifrin, Director of Public Programs In the second Museum LINK talk, Estee Solomon Gray threw down the gauntlet early: “The link, not the book, is (and always has been) the core of Judaism.” Mashing together educational theory, Talmudic dialogue and social technology, Estee spun out an integrated vision of Jewish community innovation evolving rapidly from a focus on “covenant and commandedness” to one of “community, commentary and conversation.” But even in olden times, she reminded us, Jews “evolved radically linked architectures” of text and community. Crossing the Talmud and the Internet is an inevitability, not a joke. Web 2.0 is an opportunity to experience the next generation of Jewish creativity in real time.

Thoughts from scribe-in-residence Julie Seltzer on what she's writing, her process, and the experience of writing a Torah on public view. “Is it ever boring, writing all day?” boring: “Dull, tiresome, tedious.” “Mind-numbing, monotonous." [also: “The act or process of making or enlarging a hole.”] When I was training with Jen Taylor Friedman , I happened to be working at her studio when a local reporter visited. He asked what her favorite and least favorite sections of Torah were. At the time, I was writing a certain extremely repetitive panel of torah. When I say repetitive, I mean, repetitive. I mean when I say repetitive, I mean, repetitive. The section is Numbers 7:12-7:83. It consists of the same paragraph repeated twelve times over, but with the names of different people inserted at the beginning and end of each paragraph. Given that this was the panel I was currently writing, I immediately knew how I’d answer the question (I can’t remember how Jen responded. Jen?). I wo...

Thoughts from scribe-in-residence Julie Seltzer on what she's writing, her process, and the experience of writing a Torah on public view. When I first started this Torah project, the question shocked me each and every time. At one point I was keeping track of how often it was asked, as well as what percentage of the questioners were women and what percentage were men. When the count was high but about evenly-split between men and women, I stopped caring and simply lost track. The question: "Can you write the Torah when you’re menstruating?” I have a question, too. What is up with everyone’s obsession with blood?! And when did my bleeding cycle become public interest law? Maybe that’s unfair. The Torah itself is a little obsessed with blood. Recently, I was writing a section of Leviticus that deals with a woman’s state of impurity following birth and the associative blood. She is considered in a state of tum’ah (generally translated as “impurity,” though Everett Fox in his inf...