Skirball’s Salute to Israel

At the forefront of nationwide museum celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the founding of the state of Israel are three comprehensive exhibitions opening today at the Skirball Cultural Center. Each focuses on the historic event from the American perspective.

The exhibitions--”On Moral Grounds: President Harry S. Truman and the Birth of the State of Israel,” “Israel Through American Eyes: A Century of Photographs” and “Homecoming to the Holy Land: New Work by Moshe Zabari”--explore the role of the United States in the struggle to restore Jewish settlement in the biblical Holy Land, a struggle that culminated May 14, 1948, in the declaration of an Israeli state founded on democratic principles.

The Skirball’s approach to the 50-year anniversary invokes the cultural center’s mission to interpret the Jewish American experience. In fact, Skirball Cultural Center President Uri D. Herscher believes the relationship between Israel and the United States was, and remains, so important that he questions where Israel would be today without American support--or even if it would “be” at all.

“There is no question that the U.S. was a very critical partner in the founding of Israel and sustaining it in friendship. And I dread the thought of where Israel would be without Truman’s recognition of the state,” he said.

Just 11 minutes after Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the independence of Israel on May 14, 1948, Truman gave immediate recognition to the fledgling Jewish state, paving the way for international recognition of the new nation.

In a unique partnering of the Skirball and the Harry S. Truman Library in Independence, Mo., the exhibition “On Moral Grounds: President Harry S. Truman and the Birth of the State of Israel” documents the dramatic events leading to the historic recognition. Included are original papers and correspondence, photographs and artifacts, many of which are on display for the first time.

The exhibition paints Truman as a thoughtful humanitarian, greatly influenced by the horrors of the Nazi death camps and the plights of displaced Jewish refugees after World War II.

His support of the Jewish state is attributed, in part, to an understanding of the Bible, which Truman read cover-to-cover five times before the age of 15, according to the exhibition. Because of his religious understanding, Truman saw the return of the Jews to Israel as a modern Exodus, and a return to the Promised Land.

But he faced much political opposition, including that of Secretary of State George Marshall, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal, foreign affairs advisor Dean Acheson and others. Their argument is a familiar one: that a Jewish homeland could pose a risk to America’s accessibility to Middle Eastern oil.

A highlight of the exhibition is a recent videotaped interview with George Elsey, an assistant to White House Counsel Clark Clifford during the late 1940s. The interview provides firsthand details about the political showdown over the Israeli state.

Truman, of course, prevailed, and a facsimile of the official White House statement of recognition is one of the most moving articles in the exhibition. At that point, White House aides were still uncertain about what the name of the new Jewish state would be. On the document, Truman crossed out the phrase “new Jewish State” and wrote in pencil “State of Israel.”

Elaborating on the theme of U.S. diplomacy and Israel is a related program, “Vantage Point: U.S. Foreign Policy and the State of Israel.” The public symposium, which began Sunday with former Secretary of State George Shultz, continues with other American statesmen presenting their personal perspectives on American-Israeli relations, past and present. Upcoming speakers are former Secretary of State Alexander Haig (May 21) and State Department Special Middle East Coordinator Dennis Ross (June 4).

(On Sunday, Truman’s grandson, Clifton Truman Daniel, will speak about his grandfather’s role in the birth of Israel at the Museum of Tolerance’s communitywide Holocaust Remembrance Commemoration. See Family Listings for details.)

The second of the three exhibitions, “Israel Through American Eyes: A Century of Photography,” reaches back 100 years through more than 70 original photographs.

The diverse works explore America’s fascination with the land of Israel and document the motivations of photographers--both professional and amateur--who traveled to Palestine and the state of Israel for religious pilgrimages, scholarly research, commercial interest, leisure, military service, professional assignment or permanent settlements.

A timeline that accompanies the exhibition is a good place to start, providing four perspectives on the last 100 years: world events; events in Jewish and Zionist history; Americans and Israel; and the history of photography. Below the timeline are popular Jewish artifacts, from an Aug. 16, 1948, Time magazine cover featuring Ben-Gurion, to a recent Manischewitz 50th anniversary commemorative matzo tin.

“Israel Through American Eyes” begins with the work of several photographers who traveled to Ottoman and British Palestine before Israeli statehood to document biblical holy places. Resident photo studios were established in Palestine to capture these images, including the American Colony in Jerusalem in 1898.

Albumen prints “Church of the Holy Sepulchre” (1898) and “The Dead Sea” (1900) are beautiful and exotic portraits of ancient sites. Scenes of Arab life, such as “Street in Jerusalem” (1920) are riveting in their romanticism.

With the advent of push-button cameras in the 1880s, photography became accessible to the average person. The photos of Roman Freulich, an American who served in the Jewish Legion in Palestine in World War I, document his war experiences with a box camera.

After statehood was declared in 1948, it was photography that brought the state of Israel into American consciousness. The poignant images of photojournalist Robert Capa, who documented the War of Independence and the arrival of Jewish refugees in Israel in the pages of Life magazine, are included in the exhibition.

Freulich, who returned to Israel in the 1960s after a career in Hollywood as a portrait photographer, provides some of the exhibition’s most intimate studies, such as “North African Child Training as a Cobbler” (1967).

Contemporary work, including Judith Turner’s modernist architectural series “White City,” focuses on Israel’s development into a modern country and its political problems. Veteran architectural photographer Marvin Rand explores the collective outpouring of grief caused by the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in “Year I, Municipality Parking Lot.”

The third exhibition, “Homecoming to the Holy Land: New Works by Moshe Zabari,” brings the history of Israel, the Holy Land and the United States full circle. While the Israeli-born silversmith is deeply rooted in his homeland, his work also reflects his experience in America. Beginning in 1961, Zabari spent almost 30 years living in the United States and working at the Jewish Museum in New York.

The pieces contained in the Skirball’s current exhibition date from 1989 to the present and were created in Israel upon the artist’s recent return. Included are works inspired by ritual Judaica that span 4,000 years.

A beautifully sculpted “Alms Box, 1987” takes the traditional form of a house, but the rounded silver Hebrew letters of the inscription make the piece decidedly modern. Likewise, “Spice Container, 1993” takes its sunflower form from the 17th century. But the gold-plated, hammered silver shape is pleasing in its abstraction. The flower reaches to the sky in a kinetic swirl.

Other works in the exhibition are clearly political. Zabari’s social justice series was created in response to Rabin’s assassination. The 10 sculptures are inspired by biblical stories that tell of how people respond to crime.

“Death by Stoning (Skila), 1995” is particularly violent. A brass, nickel-plated and granite sculpture, it is inspired by the story of a man gathering twigs on the Sabbath, a day the Jewish faith forbids work. As a result, the community takes him outside the camp and stones him to death. The scene is portrayed in the sculpture as an abstract form surrounded by the ominous stones.

Exhibition curator Monica Billet describes the piece as “a reflection on a time in history when a violent practice was considered acceptable.” Although such practices are rejected by modern-day society, incidents such as the Rabin assassination serve as a reminder of how little things have really changed.

Three sculptures based on biblical revelations (the artist’s most recent) offer a ray of hope.

In the brass and gold-plated “Revelation: Jeremiah, 1997” the prophet’s vision is evoked by a large eye set in the center of his head, which narrows toward the mouth touched by God’s finger. Jeremiah’s fear of not knowing how to speak to the people is calmed by God’s promise to put the words into his mouth.

“Homecoming to the Holy Land” and “Israel Through American Eyes” continue through Jan. 3. “On Moral Grounds: President Harry S. Truman and the Birth of the State of Israel” continues through Aug. 31. Film, music and family programming celebrating the 50th anniversary of the state of Israel continues through January.

BE THERE

Skirball Cultural Center, 2701 N. Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles. Hours: Tuesday-Saturday, noon-5 p.m.; Sunday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Adults, $8; seniors 65 and older and students, $6; children under 12 and members, free. (310) 440-4500.