Die Geschwister
2005
"Und willst du nicht mein Bruder sein, so schlage ich dir den schadel ein"?
The primary image for this project is the garden reverting to the desert.
It is based on a reversal of Israeli claims of transforming the desert into a paradise, a discourse that completely ignores the gardens and orchards that the Palestinians had tended for generations. Morever, the current impasse in the peace negotiations, as well as the deployment of the holocaust to authorize unconscionable violence and repression, suggests that regardless of the geographic fecundity, the political landscape is an arid one. The focal point of the installation is a pair of fabrics with parallel symbolism that hang from a clothesline. These are the talit (a Jewish prayer shawl) and the kefiah (a Palestinian head wrap). The title is derived from the the biblical notion that Jews and Arabs descend from the brothers Isaac and Ishmael and that we are indeed more like each other than we are different. Die Geschwister is part of my ongoing investigations about the connection between the holocaust and other instances of genocide. As a Jewish-American artist working in Germany for the past five years, I continue to use these opportunities to further my understanding of the many facets of past and present cultural conflict.
