Is he too ---?: Oz Almog's colorful index judeorum: the chronicle of a cultural obsession

Almog Oz je sačinio zbirku od oko 1500 portreta (30 x 30 cm, ulje na platnu), koja još uvek raste. Ovom prilikom (i u ovom štampanom katalogu) izložena su 283 portreta. Možda bi bilo pravilnije da se umesto reči „izložba“ kaže da je to instalacija jer nju, uz portrete, sačinjavaju i kratke biografije svih prikazanih ličnosti. Almog je svoje “junake” slikao više sledeći ideju da ih što vernije predstavi, nego da zadovolji umetničke uzuse. Zato se o umetničkom karakteru njegovog dela najčešće govori kao o sporednoj stvari. Svoj opus sâm autor naziva subculture art, kome cilj nije umetničko ostvarenje, već spoznaja foto-automatom percipirane karakteristične slike. Ovo nam kaže likovni kritičar Šlomit Štajnberger. Tu se, dakle, mogu sresti biblijski i mitološki likovi, junaci legendi, vojnici, holivudske zvezde, naučnici, sveci, ludaci, gangsteri, ubice, političari, humanisti... Slikarski opus Almoga zalazi duboko u istoriju jevrejskog naroda, u sve slojeve njegovog društva i sve oblasti života u kojima su se iskazali ovi njegovi sunarodnici. I koji su ostavili nekakav trag u javnosti, bilo kao dobre (najviše njih kao takve) ili loše osobe. Ukratko, to su poznati ljudi, građani sveta, dakle svačiji. Njih niti je moguće niti je potrebno odrediti samo pripadnošću jednoj veri, naciji ili državi. A ipak, svi su bili ili su još uvek Jevreji.Almog Oz has built a collection of about 1500 portraits (30 x 30 cm, oil on canvas), which is still growing. On this occasion (and in this printed catalogue) 283 portraits were exhibited. Perhaps it would be more correct to say instead of the word "exhibition" that it is an exhibition because, along with portraits, it also consists of short biographies of all the personalities shown. Almog painted his "heroes" following the idea of representing them as faithfully as possible, and not to satisfy artistic pleasures. That's why the artistic character of his work is often discussed as a secondary matter. "... The author himself calls his opus subculture art, the goal of which is not artistic achievement, but the recognition of characteristic images perceived by a photo-automat..." This is what art critic Shlomit Steinberger tells us. Here, therefore, you can meet biblical and mythological characters, heroes of legends, soldiers, Hollywood stars, scientists, saints, madmen, gangsters, murderers, politicians, humanists... Almog's painting goes deep into the history of the Jewish people, into all its layers of society and all areas of life in which these compatriots expressed themselves. And who left some kind of mark on the public, either as good people (most of them as such) or as bad people. In short, these are famous people, citizens of the world, so everyone. It is neither possible nor necessary to define them only by belonging to one religion, nation or state. And yet, all of them were or still are Jews

Tsabar.Englis

The Sabras were the first Israelis - the first generation, born in the 1930s and 1940s, to grow up in the Zionist settlement in Palestine. Socialized and educated in the ethos of the Zionist labor movement and the communal ideals of the kibbutz and moshav, they turned the dream of their pioneer forebears into the reality of the new State of Israel. While the Sabras made up a small minority of the new society's population, their cultural influence was enormous. Their ideals, their love of the land, their recreational culture of bonfires and singalongs, their adoption of Arab accessories, their slang and gruff, straightforward manner, together with a reserved, almost puritanical attitude toward individual relationships, came to signify the cultural fulfillment of the utopian ideal of a new Jew. Oz Almog's lively, methodical, and convincing portrayal of the Sabras addresses their lives, thought, and role in Jewish history. The most comprehensive study of this exceptional generation to date, The Sabra provides a complex and unflinching analysis of accepted norms and an impressive appraisal of the Sabra, one that any examination of new Israeli reality must take into consideration. The Sabras became Palmach commanders, soldiers in the British Brigade, and, later, officers in the Israel Defense Forces. They served as a source of inspiration and an object of emulation for an entire society. Almog's source material is rich and varied: he uses poems, letters, youth movement and army newsletters, and much more to portray the Sabras' attitudes toward the Arabs, war, nature, work, agriculture, cooperation, and education. In any event, the Sabra remained central to the founding myth of the nation, the real Israeli, against whom later generations will be judged. Almog's pioneering book juxtaposes the myths against the realities and, in the process, limns a collective profile that brilliantly encompasses the complex forces that shaped this remarkable generation