15 December 2009

How to Photograph God: Kabbalah through a Creative Lens and Man Plans, God Laughs

The 16 June 2006 and 13 June 2006 posts have been updated.
The 16 June post gives a preview of the book that I am currently writing: How to Photograph God: Kabbalah through a Creative Lens. More can be seen at my blog: http://photographgod.blogspot.com/.
The 13 June post retitled Man Plans, God Laughs (a Yiddish proverb) is a proposal for the creation of a new School of Art and Multimedia in Israel that was rejected and a letter to editor of The Jerusalem Post.

posted by Mel Alexenberg at 10:26 AM

The Future of Art in a Postdigital Age:
From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness
By Mel Alexenberg
Bristol, UK: Intellect Books.
in USA: University of Chicago Press

In his book, Mel Alexenberg navigates his artistic insight amid the labyrinthian complexities, explosions, and revolutions of the past forty years of art, tracing his way amid questions of science and religion, technology and environment, education, culture, and cosmos. Everyone will find his book full of new vantage points and vistas, fresh insights that give a uniquely personal history of artistic time that indeed points to new and open futures.
- Lowry Burgess, Dean, Professor of Art, Distinguished Fellow of the Studio for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

This is a wonderful and important book. The author links the history of art to the important role played by various forms of thinking in the Jewish tradition and connects that to the emerging culture of digital expression. Brilliant insights and new ways of seeing make this a must-read for anyone interested in the intellectual history of images in the 21st Century.
- Ron Burnett, author of How Images Think (MIT Press), President of Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver, Canada.

Mel Alexenberg, a very sophisticated artist and scholar of much experience in the complex playing field of art-science-technology, addresses the rarely asked question: How does the "media magic" communicate content?
- Otto Piene, Professor Emeritus and Director, MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The author succeeds in opening a unique channel to the universe of present and future art in a highly original and inspiring way. His connection between ancient concepts (Judaism) and the present digital age will force us to thoroughly rethink our ideas about art, society and technology.
- Michael Bielicky, Professor and Head of the Department of InfoArt/Digital Media at Hochschule fur Gestaltung, ZKM Center for Art and Media, in Karlsruhe, Germany.

This book is simply a must read analysis for anyone interested in where we and the visual arts are going in our future. Alexenberg has provided us with powerful new lenses to allow us to "see" how postmodern art movements and classical Judaic traditions compliment and fructify one another as the visual arts are now enlarging and adding a spiritual dimension to our lives in the digital era.
- Moshe Dror, President of World Network of Religious Futurists, and Israel Coordinator of World Future Society.

Like the Torah itself that Alexenberg refers to regularly, the book is complex. He writes in a lively, engaging style.... I found it informative, optimistic, and spiritually refreshing.
- Rob Harle, Leonardo: Journal of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology

If Jacques Derrida had not preceded him, Alexenberg would be the Jewish Marshall Mcluhan…. Alexenberg’s art and scholarship represents some of the most innovative work being made in both the Jewish and non-Jewish art worlds.
- Menachem Wecker, Forward

This book is amazing, so deep and insightful and full of sweet revelations at each turn of the page! It rocks the world and brings some desperately needed light.
- David Lazerson, author of Skullcaps ‘N Switchblades. Performing artist and education professor.

This Hebraic-postmodern quest is for a dialogue midway on Jacob's ladder where man and God, artist and society, and artwork and viewer/participant engage in ongoing commentary.
- Randall Rhodes, Professor and Chairman, Department of Visual Art, Frostburg State University, Maryland.

The Future of Art in a Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness opens new vistas in the attempts to reconcile the newest developments in digital art and postmodern critical perspectives with the ancient concerns of the arts with the spiritual. It offers fresh perspectives in how we can learn from Greek and Jewish thought to understand the present era.
- Stephen Wilson, author of Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Science, and Technology (MIT Press) and Professor of Conceptual and Information Arts at San Francisco State University.