Nature Transported/Sukkah is a collaborative project made by artists, builders, children, and other creatives. City Wide Open Studios’s Alternative Space Weekend coincides with the Jewish holiday of Sukkot; when we literally, and figuratively, transport ourselves to live outside in huts. We leave the security of our homes, to be in the uncertainty of nature. To prepare for this project, artists met with Rabbi Yaffe of Chabad of the Shoreline to study texts related to the meaning of Sukkah; in particular how it paradoxically helps us find comfort, light, and joy within transition, displacement, and the temporary. Among other themes and symbolism, the sukkah is like a birds nest--an outdoor impermanent structure that protects, shelters, nurtures etc. And like a nest, the roof of the sukkah (the skhakh) is made of natural materials that grow from the earth.

This sukkah is a pentagon covered in canvas; it is more circular and encompassing. The artwork hanging in the sukkah is made of cyanotype on cloth; cyanotype is an early photographic printing process, also known as blueprints, that was used to record nature. Leah Caroline, a local New Haven Artist, gave workshops to make the cyanotype cloths. The imagery is from actual plant cuttings, photographs of birds, and texts we studied with Rabbi Yaffe that relate to Sukkah. There is also a bird’s nest and cyanotype on eggs.

Participants:

Corina Alverezdelugo, Caroline Family, Hayward Gatling, Haston Family, Gitel Chana Levin, Shevy Levin, Chaya Sara Naiditch Susan Rogol, Chaskie Rogol, 5th Grade of SCHA

Pentagon shaped, fabric walls, star-of-David skahkh (roof), etc.

We had a few workshops to make the artwork for the sukkah at City Wide Open Studios.  We experimented on fabric, eggs, and pottery!  We used plants, images of birds, and texts we had studied with Rabbi Yaffe.