Tulsa, Oklahoma

 

From the United States to Europe to Israel and beyond established and emerging artists gathered together with creative volunteers in the week before Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, to sound the Shofar in places both urban and rural, traditional and off-the-beaten-track. We did not know most of our volunteers, any creative individual was allowed to answer our call and bring out his/her creativity - in some cases they never even contacted us until they sent us a link to their Shofar FlashMob recording.

The Shofar FlashMob was like a Midrash. Everyone interpreted the sound of the Shofar their own way. The participants also greatly differed in each location – with some even opposing each other in intention, style, approach and modality. Yet these discrete spiritual public art actions were performed simultaneously by people who would never meet otherwise or would be willing to work together.  But art allows us to access something deep inside that weaves participants at each location into a global community.

The central NYC Shofar FlashMob proved so successful that it was necessary to create two consecutive blowings at the Lincoln Center location for eager latecomers. Parking is really hard in Manhattan, so one of the participants pulled up his car and blew with us hanging out of his car. Others decided to go down and blow in the subway. Most volunteers wore their tuxedos or dresses pretending to go to a matinee at the opera. It was funny, shocking, absurd and on one level very normal to blast this ancient instrument at the grand palace of modern culture.

The jazzy flashmob at the JCC in Manhattan with Sway Machinery’s cantorial afro-beat show and the Jerusalem Shofar FlashMob at the Ben-Yehuda pedestrian mall both featured Rav Abraham Isaac HaCohen Kook's Shofar poem, performed by Rabbi Yitzhak Marmorstein, Jake Marmer, jazz musicians Rabbi Greg Wall and Jordan Hirsch.

In Budapest organizers sounded bicycle bells to raise awareness about the CarFree World Day, in San Francisco they blew on a hill with sound instruments, in Chicago volunteers gathered by the Cubs before a game, while in Brooklyn organizers blew a gigantic, scary blast as part of an exhibition opening about terror. This was tangible, audible, visual art-in-action.

Even though the Shofar FlashMob already took place, during the whole month of Elul we are providing online learning and art forum with Art Kibbutz's leading international artists, scholars and spiritual leaders associated about how Elul, the shofar, music, sound and Rosh Hashana are all connected. The online learning is led by Rabbi Greg Wall, leader of the Sixth Street Synagogue, co-leader of Hasidic New Wave. We are sharing 140 characters of deep insight and instant inspiration on Twitter and  Facebook follow #ShofarFlashMob or @ArtKibbutz. We opened up the forum to share and well established artists, like Andras Borocz (Hungary), Mel Alexander (Jerusalem) and Richard McBee (New York) shared their art with the community.
 
Art Kibbutz NYC’s mission is to celebrate the 21st century Jewish experience -- connecting one community with another, creating a glorious and multifaceted, international cultural tapestry -- I cannot think of a more exciting first event than a worldwide Shofar FlashMob. ROI’s micro grant provided us with the essential resources to create our Rosh Hashana greeting card and cover some of our basic expenses.

We would like to create a meaningful community experience for outstanding Jewish artists through providing space and resources for work, Jewish learning, ritual and networking. This seems a bit like a ‘Catch 22’: we wanted to provide space to host projects of other organizations and individual artists, yet potential funders were interested in our already existing projects. We created the FlashMob almost completely based on long hours of volunteer work and ROI’s support.

Our Shofar FlashMob demanded that attention be paid…and it was. It was featured by Arutz Sheva, Jerusalem Post, Huffington Post, Forward, JBlog Central, New York Blueprint, Baltimore Jewish Times, NY Daily News, and CNN reached out to us too…

At our public art projects there was sound, there was spirit, there was community but there was so much more. The sight of people gathering to sound the ancient ram’s horn stopped passers-by in their tracks, fulfilling the Shofar’s truest functions: creating energy, awareness and intentional community.

Big Todah for the ROIers for their financial, networking and moral support – it’s great to be in community!

Jerusalem, Israel - The Gorlin Girls (Dolev and Einav)


Jerusalem, Israel - The Korda Boys (Justin and Noam)
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In addition to New York City, footage from Shofar FlashMobs in Jerusalem (Israel), Budapest (Hungary), Tbilisi (Georgia), Kiev (Ukraine), Gomel (Belarus), Chicago (Illinois), Milwakee (Wisconsin), San Francisco (California), Oakland (California), Las Vegas (Nevada), Los Angeles (California), Tulsa (Oklahoma), Wolcott (Vermont), Salem (Massachusetts), and St. Louis (Missouri) comprise the edgy Rosh Hashana art video greeting. See it here & share: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vys7tJuLfPA

See a few other Shofar FlashMobs:
San Francisco: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyy1XE-Aylk
Jerusalem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76xQ84YdyTg
Chicago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHl-gRSiLzQ
Budapest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGXbi9XWJhM