Resident Artist (guest): Testament of Women

Abstract

Stories of biblical women claim our individual and collective imagination and exert a powerful force in popular culture and fine art. Sarah and Hagar, Ruth and Naomi, Judith, Deborah and Miriam continue to provide archetypes, points of reference against which our own experiences can be understood as we invent anew the values we draw from these women’s tales. The original impetus for my book project, Testament of Women, was a desire to respond to Sarah Laughed, by my friend and colleague Vanessa Ochs.1 Her book of essays focuses on retelling biblical tales to glean inspiration from and for contemporary women’s lives. It pushes back against traditions that perpetuate patriarchal assumptions in unarticulated and thus insidious ways. Vanessa is a contemporary, highly educated, progressive woman actively engaged with Jewish ritual. Her tales are crafted with awareness and acceptance of the changes wrought over the last generations in our cultural attitudes towards traditional institutions. Vanessa and I share many of the same values, but our projects had different conceptions. I undertook to question the existing social order of patriarchy, while I see Vanessa’s work as being engaged with extending and rethinking traditions. She is a scholar of Jewish rituals and their transformation through contemporary practices. I, as a feminist artist, focused on challenging the legacy of patriarchy. We had complementary values, but different goals. On my initial reading of Vanessa’s book, I was struck by my ignorance of the biblical tales, and that prompted me to study the original texts. My response took the form of an artist’s book. For those unfamiliar with the genre, artists’ books are original works of art in book format.2 This approach allows the artist/author full control over production and design choices, though it has the disadvantage that the book exists in only a few dozen copies, at least in the first edition. I made Testament of Women in a limited edition of forty copies, bound in poppy-colored silk, printed by letterpress in hand-set type, using linoleum