shaker shalom

 "SHALOM: Weaving Threads of Peace..." shown in conjunction with Hancock Shaker Village in Hancock, MA. , August 4th thru August 26th.

The Hancock Shaker Village invited my friend, Wendy Rabinewitz to show her Judaic weavings on the theme of Shalom, uniting with the Shaker vision of peace.  On Saturday, August 12, visitors and friends gathered to hear Wendy speak of the link between Judaic thought and Shaker thought and Shaker journeys and her own.

The Poultry House gallery is just up the puddled walk from the entry, past the little gardens on either side. 
   I jumped from puddle to puddle to the gallery, following the guide-map, humming 'simple gifts' to myself.  The Berkshire valley was so breathtaking, I had to take pictures.  I was way early for the talk, but Wendy greeted me with hugs and cheer.  We shared how magical a space it was, how beautiful the show.  Was she ready for the talk? The curator here, wanted to make sure all was ready.

 She needed to find her camera.  We looked and looked.  Finally, as husband Jeff came in, she grabbed my (pathetic imitation of an) umbrella and dashed into the rain to look in her car.  She came back soaked and camera-less, so I offered to record the whole event, and thus these pics.


While she was out, I wandered through the veggie gardens, thinking of our own farm, thinking how we could have this same lovely order.  I even passed berry patches, and found a whole cluster of red current bushes, the same size cluster as in our Grove St. home when we were little.

Any taste of the tart berries whip me instantly back into the company of Grandma and her preserves-making co-horts,  with their flowery dresses on hefty forms, keenly watching us take the cooking pans to fill with red berries on their heavy-thread stems, just strong enough not to break as you pulled the berries off in your mouth.  But alas.  No berries.

Butterflies.  Lots of butterflies.

 I returned to record the show.




 

Women at the wailing wall -- a large piece that first appeared at an exhibit at the U.N. Visitors are asked to write their prayers of peace on a little scroll, tie it with a thread, and leave it here. 

I love how the window of the Shaker village is reflected in this new piece.

From the Matriarch's series -- this is Sara, laughing.

The artistry of the Shaker table, and the simple natural stone, metal and fiber of Wendy's works.

The scroll holding a forest of wire tree-thoughts, a mezzuzah, and a solid building, built prayerfully.

The rain, it raineth, from great rolling clouds rumbling over the hills.  A nature-rich backdrop to the show, and the talk.  We turned off our cell phones, but the sky had more important calls to take, I guess.

Wendy spoke of the piece she had done especially for this exhibit, the one on the wall here.  She said the Hebrew letters came in a vision, and she wrote them down, just as she saw them.  But she doesn't know Hebrew well enough to know what it means, so she called her Rabbi friend.  "You're not going to believe this," he said.  "It's scripture.  'I will extend peace to her as a river.'" Isaiah. Shaker shalom.

   According to Wikipedia, these are the words of Moses written and bound up in this, and every little Mezzuzah.  I love the references to the rain and the corn. They're words the Shakers knew well:  "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes.  And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates.And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,  That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.  And I will send grass in thy fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be full.  Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them; And then the Lord's wrath be kindled against you, and he shut up the heaven, that there be no rain, and that the land yield not her fruit; and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the Lord giveth you. 
      "Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. And ye shall teach them your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt write them upon the door posts of thine house, and upon thy gates:  That your days may be multiplied, and the days of your children, in the land which the Lord sware unto your fathers to give them, as the days of heaven upon the earth".]

Preparing for her talk, sitting on the shin-high sill.  It was a poultry house.  How kind of the Shakers to give the chickens a nice view of the land.  I'm sure it made for cheerful chickens and cheering eggs.

It wasn't until Wendy's husband Jeff pointed it out, that we realized that the objects on the sills were all objects of weavers, Wendy's collection, not items from the Shaker museum.

To the left, the women's staff.  Shadowed by women.  The piece in the window is the true color of the piece below, but I wanted to see the rain outside, drenching the vegetable plots.

The curator introduces Wendy to rain-brave audience.  The Village expected less than a dozen people, and had to bring out more benches to accommodate the friends and visitors who came.

She speaks with eloquence and joy.

As the talk started I scrunched down against the back wall and snapped away, the light magical as the rain came and went, and Wendy eloquent. She'd done her homework, and wove the tale of the Shaker vision of inner peace, of the joy of work, the joy of work well done and celebrated in song and dance, with the joy of the Jewish traditions of moving and praying, singing the prayers.

. The symbols of her art, the Judaic symbols of the earth, the tree of life, the river of life, the flame of the burning bush, all manifest in the Shaker honor of the earth, the trees, the rain, so vitally visible through every window.  And the words of women, the woman whose vision the village was,  a refrain of the matriarchs, like Sara, Wendy's weaving of the laughing matriarch of the nations. "Listen to Sara," said God.

She closed with the amazing story of her loom.  The Shaker tradition (according to the docent, a former costume designer from nyc, it was simply making do with what you had), whose benches and tables were right there, was reflected in her story, for she found her loom in a Chicago second-hand shop, in pieces, and old friend, capable, skilled, refused to put it together for her, when he needed a favor.  "But I'll show you how, then it will do whatever you want it to."  And he did.  And she learned, and it's still in her studio, decades later, following her every thread of vision.

After applause, looking at the work anew.

Wendy with her dear Rabbi friend.

The docent, the former costume designer, (who made his own Shaker garb here) spoke to us about Shaker government, how, although the movement was begun by a woman, decision-making was divided equally between men and women, and a heirarchy, consisting of two elders, a man and a woman, governed each Shaker establishment.  I asked if this place were chosen because of the beautiful valley, and he said, yes, that was part of it. I said I was of the Christian Science faith, also founded by a woman.  He said that when there were only a few women left on the plantation in the 1950's, the Eldress said they didn't need to have their own services, but they could choose which religious service to attend in town.  Several women chose Christian Science as the faith they felt most comfortable in.  Others joined the Methodists, a few other denominations.  But one woman knew the movement was over when the services stopped, and she left the compound altogether.  Sad.
 He asked if we'd like to learn the song and the movements of a Shaker dance of peace, and we eagerly agreed.  When all the visitors had left, we gathered the close friends and family in a circle, and, like attentive 1st graders, learned every gesture to every line we sang, and sang it happily, turning, turning to come round right, with hope of peace.
Shaker shalom.