SACRED BOOKS

In this series of photographs I focused on used sacred books. I walked into the synagogue on an early winter afternoon, after “Minha” Service, and selected 30 Sidurim, Bible and Mishna books with the most wear and tear signs - the result of constant use by the men and women who pray there regularly. I set out on a journey with this collection, in the course of which I photographed, duplicated, printed, cut and created continuity for these unique sacred books. 

In the course of the process, I created a typological series from this collection of books, which connects my spiritual world represented by the synagogue, and research analytical photography.  This typological series shows both resemblance and difference among the books. In addition, it expresses the collective as opposed to the individual, and signs of time imprinted in matter.  

Having  done that, I printed out the photos of each one of the books, then  cut them out, placed and illuminated them, then photographed them, thus creating a two dimension  “bookshelf” posing as a three dimension bookshelf. In my view this placement of the clippings strengthens the connection between spirit and matter, and the aspiration to grasp the spiritual realistically.