Spertus Museum
May 8 - August 7, 1994
Statement for installation
Bridges and Boundaries, Chicago Crossings
The Book of Life, 1994
By Claire Wolf Krantz
When I agreed to create an artwork for this exhibit and to assume coorganizational responsibilities, I had first to confront my own feelings about myself as a Jew. The bi‑cultural experience of being a Jew and an American stimulated my interest in relationships between minority and mainstream culture and moved me to conceptualize my experience in my work. I often choose to write about artists who are marginalized ethnically and racially or by the types of work they do, questioning how their work relates to the mainstream. And in my mixed media paintings I design compositions which avoid hierarchical placements of elements in favor of balanced interconnections between equals, metaphorically creating new social paradigms. But this work is generally about abstract issues, about other people, not me. Now, for the first time, I felt challenged to speak directly rather than generally and metaphorically about my own ideas and feelings about being a Jew in relationship to a particular "other." How could I use my previous experience to freshly rethink specific relationships among people, or modes of thinking, to produce an interesting show and a piece of art that somehow talked to these concerns?
Indubitably, one can approach creating an exhibition and making a painting in many different ways. I decided to reflect the variety within the Jewish community by choosing artists with numerous points of view and different ways of making art. Since we were inviting artists to produce work specifically for this show, my colleague and I had to let go of the usual aesthetic control inherent in the process of selecting completed work. It seemed crucial, therefore, to choose people who had already demonstrated the ability to thoughtfully elucidate their beliefs and explore social issues via their art. As for myself, I can clarify only my own thoughts and desires, while speculating about the positions other people occupy my accuracy probably depends most on the convergency of our basic goals and assumptions.
It seems clear that Jews and Blacks choose to live in ways that reflect ideologies formed by complex and diverse cultural histories. We both deal with bigotry and injustice. However, many of our issues are different, and the specifies of these differences have not been adequately and publicly acknowledged or discussed. Thus, although we often live in close proximity, we can be invisible to each other, denying validity to each other's experiences. Falling into the same habits of stereotyping that we accuse others of doing, we ignore the diversity that exists within each group. Moreover, by not realizing that the same language and events can mean different things to different people, we neither bother to explain ourselves adequately nor listen carefully to people whose assumptions differ from ours.
In this process, hostilities among people are produced; they don't naturally exist. As minorities, we sometimes find ourselves acting out more powerful right wing agendas and hurt ourselves in the process. For instance, rivalries for scarce resources, like money for education, are translated into racial and religious terms rather than economic or ideological ones. We unthinkingly co‑operate in diverting attention from defining our own goals and from working together to develop real solutions for ourselves. Often, we ask the wrong questions. Rather than examining who decides how resources are allocated, we ask how we can get the biggest slice of an already sectioned‑off pie. We don't ask why these funds for education are so scarce, or why wealthy people deserve the best education: we reflexively compete for scraps with people who are not our enemies. Rather than asking who benefits from the poverty of the underclass, we accuse each other of producing it. We notice and name minorites when they are associated with wrong doing, as though it were the group who acted, not the individuals. Instead of imaginatively exploring new solutions for conditions that exist today, we allow historically contingent social structures like the nuclear family, which has only existed in its present form for the last 50 years or so, to be transformed into universally valid paradigms for grounding ethical behavior.
Moreover, we allow leaders who blur the meanings of words and manipulate events into tools for their own ambitions to avoid the consequences of their actions. For some people, certain words become codes: wealth = Jewish; violence = black; ambitious, manipulative leaders = Farrakhan, Arafat, or Shamir, depending on one's point of view. Even the German and Yiddish word, "schwartz," meaning black, becomes a weapon, a derogatory word, while "Jew" stands for far more than a religious or cultural group. In this process, boundaries between "self" and "other" shift their meanings and harden into enemy camps.
Both Jews and Blacks are used as scapegoats economically and politically. While Jews find it ludicrous to be seen as always rich and powerful, it must be aggravating for middle class Blacks to be automatically associated with violence and poverty. Other racial slurs are couched in scientific terms. White scholars seeking to prove that Blacks are inferior intellectually are just as exploitative as Blacks who manufacture or distort data to attack Jews. Do we question the validity of data or use it to reinforce our own hatred? Books such as "The Secret Relationship Between Blacks and Jews" exaggerate and distort Jewish participation in the slave trade while ignoring the far greater numbers of Christian and Muslim slave traders who were both Black and White. Does specious scholarship such as
this help Blacks? On the other hand, a recent book by
a Jewish writer entitled Skullcaps and Switchblades propagates stereotypes by its very title, no matter how well‑meaning its contents. In this welter of misconceptions and accusations, it seems just as unreasonable for Blacks to expect Jews to be paradigms of virtue and social responsibility as it is for Jews to expect Blacks to take a stand on all instances of racism, poverty, and violence.
My experiences growing up in Chicago didn't resemble these stereotypes or conform to current polarizations. My parents were immigrants: we didn't consider ourselves poor, but I think by today's standards, we were. My neighbors were diverse ethnically, racially, and economically. The local street gangs contained various ethnic groups, including Jews and Blacks. I was particularly afraid of white Christian boys at Easter, who beat me up because they had been taught that I was personally responsible for killing Christ. I wasn't aware of special hostilities between Jews and Blacks until I was an adult, and I heard about them from the media. But tensions do exist between us, often because we have so little understanding of why we each act as we do, or feel as we do. For instance, Jews have developed institutions and methods for coping with centuries of periodic persecution and genocide, of at best being marginalized and tolerated within hostile cultures. We developed ways to provide for our own needs, to develop jobs in professions open to us, and to keep our culture intact. I don't think we can easily understand those who have not reacted to adversity in the same way. We may not be able to imagine an identity tied to physical characteristics rather than shared beliefs, or even cultural systems that work differently than ours. Many Blacks believe that Jews have choices that are unavailable to them, assuming that at least Jews can join mainstream culture, if they wish. But Jews, in order to remain Jewish, cannot gain acceptability by pretending to be Christian. Our history is one of being forced to change ourselves into something we're not. No matter how secular the American Constitution, we live in a Christian country that promotes conformity to social structures that are not ours. In fact, many symbols and attitudes that arc labeled "Judeo‑Christian" are actually antithetical to Jewish beliefs and traditions. When Jews insist on remaining Jews, when they resist religious "improvement" and "modernization" by refusing to convert to Christianity or Islam, they will foreverremain "the Other," and thus a threat. But must "otherness" be, by definition, threatening? Must Jews be Christian in order to be okay? Must Blacks be white?
Ultimately, it is individuals who change things, who risk taking a stand on difficult issues. My way to do so is as an artist and writer. In a recent confrontation with the IRS, I found myself unable to explain to their satisfaction my motivation for spending the time, money and energy on an exhibit such as this one. In the government's view, a profit motive is the only legitimate one worthy of taxpayer support in the form of allowing professional expenses to be eligible as deductions. According to IRS rules, which reflect American values, making art has no value to our nation if it does not make enough money to tax; therefore it is a hobby. Do I write and make art solely for personal pleasure? Is my work of no use to my country? I think not. By using all the resources I can offer to affirm life, I can contribute to a process of
strengthening and healing within my community, but such transformations are not wanted by a mainstream wishing to preserve the status quo.
I hope that this exhibit will produce some changes in the relationships and attitudes of the participants as well as the viewers. It has already elicited thought and discussion. Perhaps it can counteract the media attention given to the most destructive members of our community by calling attention to the fact that we have many voices, for whom no one leader may speak. In this exhibit and catalogue, some of the feelings, assumptions and fears of both communities will be articulated and shared in a creative way. Honest talk and confrontation need not he destructive but can instead help expand our consciousness and understanding and begin to lay a groundwork for true cooperation and mutual respect. But ultimately, talk must produce action, and art must stimulate change: changes in our attitude, and changes in our behavior.
Claire Wolf Krantz is an artist, freelance critic, and guest curator.
As an artist she works in a combination of painting and photography as well as digitally created images.