A Summary of Our 2024 Award Recipients

The 2024 Naomi Anolic Early Career Jewish Visual Arts Award:   

  The winner of the 2024 Naomi Anolic Early Career Jewish Visual Arts Award is Danielle Alhassid. Ms. Alhassid is an interdisciplinary artist, who combines painting, animation, installation, and performance. Her winning proposal, 

“Go Forth O Daughters” is a multi-media project that focuses on the Yiddish book the Tsenerene. According to Ms. Alhassid, the Tsenerene is notable for its impact on Jewish culture and the status of women. It provided dramatic narratives centered around feminine biblical figures and introduced humanist and enlightened ideas into modern

Jewish culture; this diverges from the legalistic approach typical of Jewish learned discourse.

Using stop-motion animation to bring to life this moment in Jewish women’s history, the animations will incorporate portraits and archival materials, alongside drawings with ink and charcoal. The animations will be projected onto quilts within the installation space, creating an immersive environment. Ms. Alhassid’s goal is to create a space where contemporary art and Jewish tradition intersect, inviting viewers to reflect on the role of women in Jewish society.

The 2024 Isaac Anolic Jewish Book Arts Award:   

  The winner of the 2024 Isaac Anolic Jewish Book Arts Award is Susan Rostow. Ms. Rostow is a process-driven artist using printmaking, sculpture, and animation. Her winning proposal, "Threads of Passage" is a one-of-a-kind, multi-media sculptural book created as a tribute to her grandfather's life. This proposed sculptural book will integrate various materials and techniques to reflect the layers of her grandfather’s journey from Odessa, Russia / Ukraine to Ellis Island, New York City. Inspired by historical maps and documents related to his immigration story, these visual elements will be abstracted into prints and drawings and include pieces from his sewing shop—his thread collection, which Ms. Rostow inherited and cherishes. A stop-motion animation, embedded within the sculptural book through a small inserted digital video frame will bring the maps and documents to life, creating a dynamic narrative of her grandfather’s passage. An actual recording of him singing Yiddish prayers will serve as the soundtrack, adding an intimate auditory layer.  According to Ms. Rostow, "Threads of Passage" will be a tribute to her grandfather and an exploration of identity, memory, and the immigrant experience

The 2023 Bertha Anolic Israel Travel Award:   

The winner of the Bertha Anolic Israel Travel award is Ariel Aravot, an MFA student at the Rhode Island School of Design, graduating this year with an MFA in Glass. He received his BFA in Ceramics and Glass from the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel. His work focuses on blown glass objects, using interlacing both as a component of glasswork and as a metaphor for relations between person and others, and within societal, cultural, environmental and historic networks. Ariel’s work is also grounded in his family, and Israel’s, history: a great uncle immigrated to Israel in the 1930’s and worked in the Gavish Glass Factory. His proposal involved applying his perspective as a glass artist in curating a catalogue documenting the history of the glass industry in Israel.