Incredible exhibition of an entire 48 pages of eliminated arts. Created by arthur shake in the 1930s. It is able to tell the stories of the israelites, as well as sound an alarm for what was happening in europe at the time in the rise of not see of them do not see if across the land. How would you explain the world, hagada. It is the book used during the passover, which is the ritual dinner that is held one time a year passover is eight days. But it is usually held on the first and second nights. And then again on the final night. The hadaga is the book that gives the instructions. It includes passages from the bible. It includes sections on ritual and songs. Many times, it includes illustrations. I think we have a couple pictures to show folks about examples in the exhibit. What are we looking at here . This is a page that illustrates the four questions. And one very critical part of the tradition is dialogue. And the asking him questions, and the retelling of the story through conversation. This page shows the passing on of the story from one generation to the next. Wonderful. I think we have one other image to show. This is an illustration of the four sounds sons and it is supposed to represent all of mankind. And all these different types. So what is really important about this page is that we have the wicked son, and it is illustrated similarly to a german aristocrat, referencing a nazi. You can see that he has a mustache that is similar to hitler. And this is one of the ways that shake was able to draw parallel to his contemporary society. In his contemporary time, how was he regarded . With doing this kind of art in some ways, truth telling, but not without risk in art . He was what he was very wellknown for his political propaganda. He was hired by many popular magazines and periodicals to illustrate to make cartoons. They were all very critical of the powers during world war ii. This was really his life work. He had a difficult time getting it published. It took him years to find someone who would be willing to publish it because of the strong message and political content. In the end, he was able to put together a group of private donors to publish the book. This has really been a cultural asset in San Francisco for so many years and attracts people from all over the bay area, and tourists from all over the country and the world. Im wondering when they make a decision about making an exhibit, what goes into making that kind of a decision to put something into a museum for folks to come into and interact with . There are a couple of important ways that we measure projects when we think about them. First and foremost, it is quality. Second, i think it is scholarship. And i think a third and fourth but of equal importance, its impact on community. And also, making sure that there are significant opportunities for multigenerational sharing of knowledge. The shake exhibition provides a perfect opportunity for that. Another thing that is nice, especially with this particular episode, in terms of community work, we had a hugely successful opening for the exhibition with over 600 people in attendance. And Anthony Russell who will be on the segment leader for the jewish Music Festival lead a group of performers. It was very well received. It is a wonderful thing as with almost any kind of community especially with a museum that is so energized. We throw good parties. We will take a quick break and come back to mosaic in just one moment. Welcome back to mosaic. Im rabbi eric weiss and honored to be your host. We are in the middle of a wonderful conversation with James Leventhal who is the Deputy Director at the contemporary Jewish Museum work and museum. We were talking about the contemporary Jewish Museum. I know there are a couple of other exhibits for us to let folks know about. We have a couple of pictures. When we jump into that exhibit. Okay. One of our most exciting exhibitions of the season is called, designing home, jews and midcentury modernism. I dont know if you have noticed recently the excitement over midcentury design. And we were looking at this phenomenon and recognizing that there were so many jewish architects and designers, patrons and advertisers, who are contributing to the success of this design movement. And so we have organized the show with a rock with a wonderful curator out of new york. We are focusing on the contribution that choose that the jewish people made to the design and the midcentury. We have another visual we will show folks. What is this were looking at . This is a wonderful image. It is very pertinent to us in the bay area. Many people will recognize the ikler home. The designer was not an architect. But he hired architects that were working in this style. And trying to make these homes accessible and available for all. So we have many developments here in the bay area. And he was jewish and a very important supporter of this movement. It is interesting. As you are speaking, i am thinking that for any ethnic group, when they are a certain race or class or religion, often times they make an impact in a field because there is a gap in that field. They see the gap and they move into it. And im just wondering if you know, in the field of architecture and home design, if what we now call mid center design, was at that time something considered not favorable to the architectural establishment in the Jewish Community. And the Jewish Community saw that gap and moved into it, and in that way, helped to define what we now think of as quite an important architectural movement, in the way homes are designed and lived in. That is a really fantastic point. We see what was happening at this time, when many jewish architects where emigrating from europe. They had to come to the United States and see this opening. They were able to take the lessons from the practices they were using in europe about functionality and material. And they came to the United States and have this freedom that they did not have before. And donald makes a wonderful point in that, in europe, people were forced to assimilate through blending in and following what was happening. But coming here to the United States, there was the freedom to take the lead. And really look forward. And so the title is actually, is neither about to gentile nor jew. It is a wonderful story to be told. These people were not working in isolation. There were jews and gentiles and many people working on the field in the field. We saw that the jews really took the lead. We saw earlier, a couple of everyday, arts quarterly, i believe. That featured those images of jewish designer work. And also we had supporters of these publications end of the Museum Programs that were jewish. And so there is this whole network and the way that these were distributed. And the exhibition will talk about all of that. And how beautiful objects they are. Can you let us know a little bit more about that general programs at the contemporary Jewish Museum . Another interesting segue into the later segment is, in between these two exhibitions, arthur shake and designer home april 19, we will do this during passover. The museum will be free for the entire week of passover. It is a special evening event. That saturday evening. Again, Anthony Russell will be participating and helping to host will be the, roast of moses. There will be a dinner followed by an important largescale event. And a nice way to think about rituals together. A series of important Public Programs and lectures throughout the summer that will culminate in one of the programs entitled, do well. Which will also be helping to promote the exhibition. But we will have a pop up shop in the Museum Gift Shop at the time. James, thank you for being with us. We will say goodbye to james and lily. And welcome the 29th Music Festival guest. In the meantime, here is how you can access the contemporary Jewish Museum and go visit them. Good morning and welcome to mosaic. Im rabbi eric weiss. Im honored to be your host this morning. We are in the middle of a wonderful conversation about the arts in the Jewish Community. I would like to introduce you to Anthony Russell who is a performer and singer here in the community. And also the interim executive director of the 29th jewish Music Festival. Welcome anthony and andy. What is new at the 29th jewish Music Festival . We have just come off of a very successful floor performance run of a musical with english supertitles. It was put together by a very talented local group of singers and actors. We had four performances at the Jewish Community center at the east bay, which is the sponsor of the Music Festival. And had almost 800 people come to see live theater. It is amazing. And we move from that to the spring jewish Music Festival starting march 20 with a show at San Francisco and an israeli rock star who is performing the music of his grandfather who was a pop star and songwriter in the 1930s and 40s. A special guest is another great israeli player. We go to saturday march 22, to freight and salvage in berkeley with a wonderful jazz band from the east coast that blends africanamerican music and jewish music. We have a similar but even more unique blend of music coming the next night at the jss east bay with our friend anthony doing a show called, convergence, with the great bay area trio. We move a few days later to thursday, march 27 for a performance by alicia ravens, who is a wonderful singer and songwriter who has put together a onewoman show that she calls, a cottage for bernie madoff. It is a song looking at issues like what happened with bernie madoff. She performs again with her band called got, girls in trouble, based on women in the bible. We ended the festival with a show by, a great jazz player, author and scholar, about jews and the Great American songbook. So we start with the great iraqi songbook and finished with the american songbook. What a Diverse Group of folks coming to the bay area for all this music. Anthony, you are among them. Yes. We will show this in a moment. When it you set that up now so we can look. This piece is an illustration of two parallel histories. So a jewish history from 19th century and a parallel africanamerican history, from the same period. What i do is i combine what i would call the roots music from each culture, that would be the religious songs, the spiritual songs, work songs and lullabies, in order to create this simultaneous history. Wonderful. Lets take a look. At the end of this, we will see more information about the jewish musical festival. We will take a break and return with anthony and andy. Lets look at anthonys piece. [ music ] music track [splash] [drill sargeant] attention [boots hitting floor] [bells ringing] lean on me. When you are not strong [helicopter propeller] the Coast Guard Foundation gave me funds to attend school. During that same time, my wife was pregnant. The foundations grant allowed us to buy food, diapers, clothing. [helicopter propeller] Coast Guard Foundation really helps us to keep in touch with our families. They make an impact and it leaves an impression that you dont forget. I would like to thank the Coast Guard Foundation for helping out when times were tough. [helicopter propeller] [male announcer] because sometimes, even the rescuers need to be rescued. The Coast Guard Foundation. Proudly supporting the men and women of the United States coast guard and their families. Find out how you can help at rescue the rescuers dot org the jewish Music Festival runs from march 20 until april 1. The website is jewish Music Festival. Org. You can reach them at this phone number. Extension 126. Welcome back to mosaic. Im rabbi eric weiss. Were in the middle of a wonderful conversation about the jewish Music Festival with the interim director of the Music Festival. We have a performer and yiddish singer. Anthony, we ended the last segment with you singing. Im wondering if you can let us know a little bit about how you put together yiddish music and africanamerican music and come up with the ways in which you perform and bring music to the public. That particular instance, it is full of narratives and stories and songs about moses. And that particular song is an israeli folk song about moses hitting a rock in the water. And likewise, the africanamerican there is many songs about moses as well. A song in which moses and the israelites are afloat. I combine both songs so it was this continuous narrative about moses and the israelites and about water. And by doing that, i am telling one story from two different sources simultaneously. That is kind of this piece convergence. And for you, how do you explain the power of music to transcend culture, with a particular culture, and create that kind of empathy of one culture to another, which seems to be part of what you are doing with this particular piece. And im just wondering, in the backdrop for you as an artist, how you think about articulating those things, in the way that you did. Music, and i would say especially jewish music and africanamerican music, have the proportions of an emotional time machine. When you hear it, you are taken to a particular emotional moment. They can be viewed with history, belief or culture. As both kinds of music share these things, it was a natural progression for me to combine them at the points of which they overlap. Which are, any number of points. It helps of course to be both africanamerican and jewish in order for this to happen. In order to have this music and these emotions, all in the same place. So in a sense, this piece is an externalization of an ongoing conversation that i have within myself. Anthony, andy, i know that anthony is one performer in the Music Festival. And not unusual to what the Music Festival brings forth to the community at large. Im just wondering, in the world of jewish Music Festivals around the world, it seems that what we have here in the bay area brings diversity that isnt particularly duplicated in other places. I think that is true. That has always been an underlying motivation of the festival. One that was pushed by our director, who was on leave this year in poland. And we are always looking to bring in the widest range of music possible and not focus on any one kind, because that is really the story of jewish music. Jews have lived all over the world. Jewish music is world music. We have been everywhere. We take the essence of our music and our culture and blended with the cultures we have heard around us, to come up with a particular new form of music. That is wonderful. It is the 29th jewish Music Festival. It is taking place at venues throughout the entire bay area, correct . That is true. Both at the San Francisco Public Library and at berkeley at the Jewish Community center at the east bay. And at st. Johns presbyterian person. Wonderful. It runs march 20 through april 1. And people can go on the website. Jewish Music Festival. Org for more information as well. That is right. If you want to reach me, extension 118. Wonderful. Thank you so much andy and anthony for being with us. We ask you so many questions here on mosaic. We would like to ask the viewer is a question the question is this. In a world that needs so much healing, if you could change one thing about the world, what would it be . Thank you so much for being with us on mosaic. Welcome to bay sunday. Im your host frank mallicoat. Good to have you with us. We begin with our weekly pitch. If you have a show idea, we would love to hear from you. Go to the facebook page, facebook. Com bay sunday. Go to the page and hopefully we can hook up. Showtime now. More focus, less stress. A sense of calmness. How would you like to incorporate that into your lives . Our next guest has the planned by integrating mindfulness into education and life. The benefits are limitless. He is a Program Director of Mindful School giving children an inner compass to better guide them through life. Lets say hello to chris mckenna. How are you . Great. We have been chatting off camera. Tell us this mindfulness. It is a big word. What do you mean by that . I think the first thing i would say