From selfies to spirituality

Mel Alexenberg is an artist, educator, writer and blogger working at the interface between art, science, technology and culture whose artworks are in the collections of more than 40 museums worldwide. Now the conceptual artist is offering the digital generation a way to find life’s meaning through “spiritual blogs.”

Alexenberg’s most recent project is a book and accompanying online project titled “Photograph God: Creating a Spiritual Blog of Your Life.” The book explores the convergence between biblical narrative, kabbalah and digital technologies. It demonstrates how to create a blog by photographing the “divine light” of God “as revealed in everyday life while crafting a dialogue between the blogger’s story and the biblical story.”

For example, Alexenberg, who was born in 1937, asked his students at Ariel University, located in the Israeli settlement of Ariel in the West Bank, to photograph everyday examples of the 10 divine kabbalistic attributes. Among the results:

Chesed (kindness/largess/loving all): “… an elderly man responding to feral cats hungry for love and food. He pets each one and portions out food for them.”

Tiferet (beauty/aesthetic balance/inner elegance): “the birth of a calf, an awesome event expressing deeply felt beauty of seeing new life coming into the world.”

Hod (splendor/gracefulness/magnificence): “… the glorious feeling of young lovers kissing. She photographed their shadow as the hed (echo) of the event.”

Born in New York City, Alexenberg received degrees from Queens College, Yeshiva University and New York University. He has held a variety of positions over the years at places such as Columbia University, Pratt Institute and MIT, according to his website. In Israel, he has taught at Tel Aviv University, the University of Haifa, Bar-Ilan University, Ariel University, Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, and more.

Alexenberg’s own spiritual blog (which can be viewed at bibleblogyourlife.blogspot.com) was created together with his artist wife, Miriam, to celebrate their 52nd wedding anniversary. During each of the 52 weeks of their 52nd year, they posted six photographs that reflected their life together, along with bits of text that related the weekly Torah reading to their shared five-plus decades.

So, with Genesis 1:31 — “God saw all that he had made, and behold, it was very good. It was evening and morning, the sixth day.” — comes a photo of a cactus, a white dog, a fish and more. 

“On the first day of our honeymoon, we bought a cactus plant. On the 42nd year of our honeymoon, our daughter bought us this cactus.”

Later it says, “Our dog Snowball sits under our kitchen table,” and “The mysteries of Creation are best revealed through dialogue with other species. Snowball teaches us daily about these mysteries.”

There’s also the explanation that there is no seventh picture, because Shabbat is a nonart day.

For Parashat Mishpatim, there are quotes from two sections of Exodus: “Six days shall you accomplish your activities and on the seventh day you shall desist” (Exodus 23:12) and “The seventh day is Sabbath … you shall not do any creative work” (Exodus 20:10). These are accompanied by photos of televisions and other technology and pronouncements about how wonderful a gift Shabbat is for providing a break from our fast-paced world. 

But then Alexenberg concludes: “On the eighth day, we can return with renewed energies to being partners of God in continuing creation. 

“We can enjoy the technological wonders of our era knowing that we are free to tune out, turn off, and unplug on the next Shabbat.”

The Jewish Journal contributed to this report.