OHRA 2007

Jerusalem Mosaic

Art: Drawn on-site on walks around Jerusalem, 2007
Framed: 27 ¼ in. H x 31 ¼ W
Media: Pencil, ink on coffee-stained drawing paper.

~

The drawing depicts buildings, walls and sites of Jerusalem's multi-faith history, architecture and peoples: Jewish, Muslim, Christian.

~

In the drawing: The Montefiore Windmill, in Liberty Bell Park, near the Scottish Guesthouse and German Colony district and the old train station. Walking distance to the Old City, which is where the mosque and a church, seen on the right between the depiction of the windmill and Zakariah's tomb (inside lower right) in the Mount of Olives Jewish cemetery.

~

The wall with the faded UNWRA sign, seen at lower left, is along the paved road that goes around the old Walled city and which led me to where I drew Zakariah's Tomb.

~
The bottom of the drawing has lines of handwritten notes I’d jotted down while drawings several sections outdoors, all written in pencil except one note written in drawing ink, as noted. (The quotation marks in the text that follows are not in the writing in the drawing itself; I only added the quotation marks here)

“3pm, May 14: Three ultra-Orthodox men come to look. From Yerushalayim. One asks: “You sell?”
I reply “I hope so.” They don’t understand. I add “I wish!” One smiles shyly and nods approval.
Earlier, 8 or 9 Palestinian boys came over and eventually had great fun throwing leaves & cig butts on me til I packed up, sigh.”

~

“May 14: Three soldiers leap the wall behind me. I thought to patrol but I glance back a moment and they’re each “taking a slash” (as the Brits say).”

~
“13 May. How much more stimulation can I absorb? Mercy me! There are now 12 sheep grazing below  me. Four middle age women walk by slowly, within arms reach, speaking Greek (I think). One wears a nuns habit, unlike any I’ve seen before.  On the long path below me, dirt, a Riderless horse gallops back and forth for several minutes, evidently enjoying a brief near several minutes of total freedom… a few minutes later, the nun and her friends are several hundred feet below me, on the dusty if paved road at the bottom of the valley, above which is the Jewish cemetery, praying ultra-Orthodox, Zakariah’s tomb…”
~
[In ink]: “Then 2 soldiers, men, with kippot, come over and blah de blah in Hebrew.
I…[ink blob] English…one says to the other Inglit! He asks Soldiers? I say “none here.” They go off, looking for their platoon.”

~
“230 pm May 13: Two young ultra-Orthodox men stop & ask me for directions.
I don’t know. One speaks English – a bit. He says “where are you from?” I say “Seattle.”
He looks quizzical. I ask Do you know where California is? He says yes. I say it’s north of California but south of British Columbia – Canada. He says “I’m from N.Y.”
I assume he and his pal are mamaloshen speakers only. “
~
[At far right, written perpendicular to the other notes]:
“May 13 ’07 Decided to not sit on stone wall: Small red ants, black ants and a spider inspect my tuchus and drawing. An Arab boy walks by and says Salaam alekhem and I reply in kind.

Are there snake – [indecipherable] nearby? Oy!“