The tzon barzel, or, “iron flock,” is the theme of the upcoming film, which was delayed until now as a result of the attack on October 7 and the conflict in Gaza. It is a Rabbinical maxim that any property a woman brings to her marriage stays hers regardless of the outcome of the union. This term is used in modern Hebrew to refer to someone who is a social asset to the Jewish people.
Curated by Emily Bilski, “Threading”, one of 30 events at the Biennale, uses textile art to discover “the vast reservoir of historical property created by Hebrew women”. Seven contemporary designers’ works are housed among the everlasting historical collections of the Museum of Italian Jewish Art, many of which are garments that have been recycled from their everyday lives to make religious items like Torah binders. “Threading” features works by seven modern artists.
Several of the “Threading” artists were inspired by this practice of “upcycling” textiles. Actor transformed her wedding dress into a beautiful speech about Jewish women’s power in the title “What We Bring” in a particularly impressive creation. Arnovitz split her own bridal gown in two, and laser cut 2, 611 names of powerful Hebrew women — including Deborah Lipstadt, Bella Abzug, Bette Midler, Barbara Streisand, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Eva Hesse and Gilda Radner — from light bookbinding cloth, which is smooth still strong. Arnovitz said she “imagined these names bursting out of this wedding dress.” These Jewish women have changed history, and there is no way to contain this wealth of cultural assets. We are who we are because of them.
Arnovitz said she “pulled out names that meant something to me, from my generation”, and positioned them at the bottom, so that they create a huge circle on the floor, and are easily read.
The dress was handmade by her grandmother, who sewed the pearls on. LaVine Fabrics, her father and grandmother’s fabric store, was located in Kansas City.
“From the time I was a little girl”, Arnovitz said,” I was surrounded by fabrics and people sewing. It’s in my blood, it’s under my skin”. She has continued this family tradition by bringing sewing and weaving into many previous artworks, such as” Heavy” ( 2020 ), a shroud with 50, 000 discs representing the number of civilians killed in the Syrian civil war, and the giant” Vest of Prayers” ( 2009 ), which she calls” the antithesis of a suicide vest, it’s a hopeful vest and who we are as the Jewish people”.
Whereas a suicide vest is filled with sharp bolts and nuts designed to maximize injury,” the ultimate Jewish tool”, she says, “is prayer and paper”. Arnovitz rolled the pages into scrolls before wrapping and tied them with silken thread after rescuing several dozen prayer books she found discarded in Mea Shearim.
Arnovitz sees a connection between the gestures she makes when making these garments and those used in Jewish ritual.
“I personally think”, she said,” there is a whole set of gestures that are uniquely Jewish — wrapping, binding, winding and tying, and gestures that appear over and over again in Jewish ritual. We bind Torah, men wrap tefillin, Jewish women when we light candles, we bring light to our eyes three times, we braid challah, the bride walks around the groom seven times — these gestures repeat over and over again”.
The repetition of these Jewish rituals creates a sense of collective memory. When we decorate Tefillin or light candles, we recreate the gestures that Jewish people and women made thousands of years ago.
In making “What We Bring”, Arnovitz repeats these gestures: she bound the names to each other by sewing them together, she wrapped the names around the dress, creating what she calls a “circle of strength”, she tied the threads of each name to the dress and to each other. Perhaps that’s why this work has such powerful evocative power, making us think of the generations of Jewish women who have come before us.
Although it was developed before Oct. 7, “What We Bring” demonstrates the resilience of Jewish women and how it regains and reasserts Jewish women’s power in response to Hamas’ barbaric rape attempt to humiliate and degrade Jewish women. The dress, suspended in air, cascading to the floor, is both ethereal and powerful, graceful and strong, a symbol of the strength and beauty of Jewish women, in Israel and the world. “It is a Jewish feminist statement that’s badly needed right now”, Arnovitz said.