JCC R & R Shabbat Installation

Installation artist Michele Brody has worked with the staff of the Jewish Community Center in Manhattan to transform the lobby space each Shabbat from the sleek, modern lines of its daily functions into a scene from the floating world.

Welcoming the Sabbath Bride with white, lucid columns of flowing architecture, the transformation serves as a cleansing transition from the din of the work-week and outside world, into a space open for relaxation and reflection. Finding inspiration from the Japanese cloud paintings of the Edo period, the hanging series of Cloud sculptures by Lenore Tawney, and the elements of clean design for meditative spaces, this installation for R & R: Shabbat at the JCC is intended to create a sense of delight, and a feeling of ease and weightlessness that encourages all who enter the JCC to take a break and enjoy Shabbat in the fullest of its possibilities.

Michele Brody has spent the past 12 years creating site-specific, mixed media installations and works of public art that are generated by the history, culture, environment, and architecture of a wide range of exhibition spaces. The essence of her work is to understand how we live with change and the constant flux of our environment. Michele has had one-person shows all over the world, two major permanent public art installations in The Bronx and a uniquely designed manhole cover to commemorate the Assay Office that once stood at 30 Wall Street. She is the recipient of grants from the Pollock/ Krasner Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, and New York State Council on the Arts’ Architecture, Planning & Design Program.

For more information on R & R Shabbat please go to: http://www.jccmanhattan.org/category.aspx?catid=2271

The Jewish Community Center in Manhattan is located at 334 Amsterdam Ave @ 76th Street