TITLE: Machine Mama

GENRE: Theater

DESCRIPTION: A new mother desperate to re-enter the workforce interviews with an AI company where she learns the hidden value of her labor and the true cost of innovation.

INSPIRATION: 

“‘What, are you mocking me? Are they sentient at all?’ He said to him: ‘Do your ears not hear what your mouth is saying?’” 

— Bereshit Rabbah, 38:13

TITLE: I am CHANGE

GENRE: Art/ Mixed media

DESCRIPTION: I am CHANGE is built from countless fragments, good and bad, pain and joy, fear and courage. I focus on vulnerable moments of clarity and strength, believing that what we focus on shapes who we become. Through honesty and an open heart, I hope to connect with the viewer, allowing them to feel to be seen and encouraged on their own journey.

INSPIRATION:  “1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. 3 And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.”
–Genesis, Chapter 1

PROJECT TITLE: Leaving California

GENRE: Audio-Visual Performance 

DESCRIPTION: Leaving California challenges the seduction of constant change and exile in order to truly break the idols of my youth. Through three country-folk songs and an accompanying visualizer, this piece meditates on an extensive inner world with guidance from ancestors and community. 

INSPIRATION:  “From where do we learn that those who do repentance are counted as if they ascended to Jerusalem, built the Temple, built the altar, and offered upon it the sacrifices of the Torah? From this verse: Sacrifices to God are a broken spirit; [a broken and depressed heart, Elohim, You will not despise] (Psalms 51:19) An offering takes place only through meditations of the heart…”
–Vayiqra Rabbah 7:2-3

TITLE: On the Water I Disappear
GENRE: Film
DESCRIPTION: Often, religion and spirituality exist in a realm separate from surfing. Rabbi Chel Mandell, a gender-expansive trans surfer and rabbi, traces the tender intersections of these seemingly opposing identities through vulnerable storytelling of their experiences on the water.
INSPIRATION: “Look, today in the time of Exile, it is easier to grasp the Holy Spirit than it was in Temple times. A parable: when a king is in their palace, you can't draw as close to them as you can when they are on the road, or anyone can approach them, even a villager for whom it would be indecent to appear before the king and their palace. But when you are on the road, at an inn, you can come before the king and speak with them. So too, today in exile, when you think about flushness with divinity, then the blessed one immediately dwells with you and is present with you.” 
–Dov Ber “the Maggid” of Mezritsh, Maggid Devarav le-Ya’akov (Korets, 1781), fol. 9b

TITLE: A Hole is to dig / Gray Ghost 

GENRE: Installation Art

DESCRIPTION: The project bridges artifacts, memory objects from the Magnes Collection and contemporary migration stories, using sculpture, video, and installation to spark intergenerational dialogue on identity, belonging, and loss. Centering change, it frames migration as a step into the unknown,  a threshold crossing that unravels and remakes the self in an unfamiliar land. 

This arc echoes my own migration, which I use as a living lens through which objects that carry memories, and place converges into a renewed sense of changing identity.

INSPIRATION:  “Go forth from your land, from your birthplace, and from your father’s house, to the land that I will show you.”
— Genesis 12:1

TITLE: Burn Line

GENRE: Photography

DESCRIPTION: Burn Line is a project that meditates on loss, resilience, and transformation in the face of California's wildfires. It employs a unique "Pyrotype" process to engrave images into wood and transform them into black-on-black charcoal objects, reflecting on how trauma reshapes objects and memory.

INSPIRATION: “God spoke to Moses from within the bush, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed.”
— Exodus 3:2

TITLE: CALLED

GENRE: Dance

DESCRIPTION:CALLED is a response to cultural divisions. The piece utilizes community engaged choreography as strategy for pluralist world-making within religious institutions. An intergenerational duet, it reflects excerpts and key findings from a larger scale production that took place within the Church of St Ignatius Jesuit community in May 2025. The cast, in collaboration with St Ignatius parishioners, staff, and clergy considered through choreography and group discussion: How can we expand tradition to make space for a religious institution's new identity? How might intergenerational activity revitalize faith based communities? What lessons from one’s personal lived experience of aging lend to the call for institutional evolution? 

INSPIRATION:  “[Elijah] arose and ate and drank and walked with the strength of that food for forty days and forty nights as far as the mountain of God at Horeb. There he went into a cave, and there he spent the night. Then the word of YHWH came to him, saying: ‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’ ‘I am moved by zeal for YHWH, the God of Hosts,’ he said…
‘Come out and stand on the mountain before YHWH.’ And behold, YHWH passed by. There was a great and mighty wind, splitting mountains and shattering rocks by the power of YHWH—but YHWH was not in the wind. After the wind, an earthquake—but YHWH was not in the earthquake. After th earthquake, fire—but YHWH was not in the fire. And after the fire—a sound of faint silence. When Elijah heard, he wrapped his mantle around his face and came out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And, behold, a voice said to him:
‘What are you doing here, Elijah?’”
–I Kings 19: 8-13

TITLE: Dusted Tongues

GENRE: Poetry

DESCRIPTION: The poems in this in-process manuscript grapple with language and meaning in a constantly changing, troubled world. Everyday moments are sacralized, religion is emphatically politicized, and the poet is constantly changing her mind.

INSPIRATION: “Look, today in the time of exile, it is easier to grasp the divine than it was in Temple times. Just as when a king is in their palace, you can’t draw as close to them as you can when they are on the road, where anyone can approach . . .  So too, in exile, when you just think of drawing close to God, the holy presence is immediately with you.”
–Dov Ber “the Maggid” of Mezritsh, Maggid Devarav le-Ya’akov (Korets, 1781), fol. 9b

TITLE: All Streams Flow into the Sea

GENRE: Visual art; portraiture

DESCRIPTION: “All Streams Flow into the Sea” is an exploration of how all that we have seen, learned, and experienced—everything that has come before us—is processed and eventually renewed in our art.

INSPIRATION: “All things are exhausting:
No man can ever state them; The eye never has enough of seeing, 
Nor the ear enough of hearing.
Only that shall happen
Which has happened,
Only that occur
Which has occurred; 
There is nothing new under the sun!

–Ecclesiastes 1

TITLE: THE I AND THOU PHONE

GENRE: Interactive conceptual art

DESCRIPTION:

Presented as an alternative to the fast-paced, algorithmic, and noisy narcissism of the iPhone age, THE I AND THOU PHONE is a tool for users to first slow down and get close to G-d through the Jewish meditation practice of hitbodedut (so they can hear their own still, small voice) and next step into an I - THOU mindset as they exchange ideas with others in the community. THE I AND THOU PHONE invites users to mindfully engage in Machloket l’shem shamayim (sacred arguing) with the larger Jewish community, in an effort to change the way we communicate from fast to slow, from unconscious to conscious.

INSPIRATION: “Every Jew is obligated to seek divine oneness and unity, without ever letting their soul go limp for even a moment.. When the dimension in which you now serve falls into oldness for you, switch it for another kind of garment - this will grant you new insight.” 
–Ze’ev Volf of Zhitomir, OR ha-Me’ir (Korets, 1798) parashat yitro, fols. 53a-b

"The primary word I-It can never be spoken with the whole being. 

The primary word I-Thou can only be spoken with the whole being" 
– Martin Buber, "I and Thou"