ahuva s. zaslavsky

ahuva s. zaslavsky lives and works in Portland, Oregon, USA. ahuva graduated from The University of the Negev, Israel with a BA in behavioral sciences. ahuva completed her MFA in Visual Studies at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, earning the LR Visual Studies MFA Thesis Award. In her work, ahuva looks into the relationship of space and place to memory and trauma, displacement, the outcast, belonging and rejection, power struggles and unsatisfied human desires, grounded in a personal read of Jewish mythology and reflections on the relationship between the creator/maker and materials, the circular nature of creation and the potential of transformation and change. Through writing, painting, printing, sculpting and other mediums, her investigations permeate the social and domestic, the cultural and psychological. Her work has been shown locally and nationally. ahuva has completed the Art/Lab fellowship in 2022 and was named to GLEAN Portland’s 2022 artist residency. Between These Borders Wanders a Golem is her first book.

Shoshana Gugenheim Kedem

Shoshana Gugenheim Kedem | שושנה גוגנהיים קדם is an American/Israeli social practice artist, Torah scribe, curator and chutzpanit. Her work often rests in the borderlands where tradition and change meet, allowing for new forms to emerge. Shoshana’s work takes shape as large and small scale collaborations with public and private audiences in a wide array of contexts from prisons, to houses of faith, museums, schools, rural fields or rivers. These socially engaged encounters are sculpted by brave and sometimes whimsical collaborations perhaps through a conversation, a blind-folded game, a silent canoe ride, an urban walk, a civics test, a shared meal or more.

Shoshana was one of the first women in modern times to train and practice as a Torah scribe. She led the creation of two Torah scrolls written collectively and exclusively by women. Her scribal work inspired her international Jewish women artists collaboration, Women of the Book, launched with the Jerusalem Biennale 2015. Today her work as a scribe manifests through Or Hadash | חדש עור , an art in(ter)vention into the contemporary parchment making industry. Shoshana is the Co-Founder and Director of Art/Lab: Innovating Jewish Arts and Culture, a not for profit serving Jewish artists and their audiences in the Pacific Northwest. After 20 years in Israel, Shoshana now resides with her partner, their children and their furry ones in the Dyer Street Shtetl. There she co-directs and co-curates The Gug(g)enheim Portland in her family residence. Shoshana speaks, teaches and consults internationally.

Shoshana Gugeheim Kedem:
Instagram: @shoshanagugenheimkedem
Website: www.shoshanagugenheim.com