Daughter of founder ‘Worthy of Bezalel’

Written By: Meir Ronnen

The Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design today celebrates its move to Mount Scopus with a series of festive ceremonies. The huge new campus will be ready for the new academic year starting in November. The building has a few rough edges, though, and not all students are happy about the move. Meir Ronnen reports:

A highlight of today’s ceremonies marking the inauguration of the new Bezalel Academy campus on Mount Scopus and the opening of the annual meeting of its board of governors, will be the conferring of the title “Worthy of Bezalel” on Zohara Schatz, daughter of Bezalel founder Boris Schatz. A sculptress in her own right, Zohara, an indefatigable worker for the Jerusalem Artists Association, was born in the Bezalel complex, where she still lives in the original Schatz apartment. It is understood that she has willed the premises to the academy, where she and her late brother Bezalel Schatz were both students.

Another highlight of the festivities, which will be attended by President Chaim Herzog, Mayor Teddy Kollek and whoever becomes education minister, will be a happening by the Zik group, which is now evidently considered de rigueur at all Jerusalem artistic openings. Most of the group are Bezalel graduates. On this occasion, they are to carve a representation of the historic premises out of ice, then cut an entrance in it through which the guests will pass as they enter the Swig building.

Also set up outside the building are a group of jolly painted figures executed by first-year students of graphic design, some of them representing Bezalel personalities. Indoors, the academy will open an exhibition of a decade of work by Bezalel graduates, curated by visiting professor Philip Leider. A show of student work on the theme “Moving to Scopus,” curated by lecturer Milka Cizik, will also go on view.