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AHAVA, Samantha Ganz Panzier
A note from the artist: I make Ahava wallhangings as wedding and housewarming gifts. The art will always mean love and can be handed down from generation to generation. There’s something special about stitching these letters together that mean love which is really the basis of how generations begin. The three represented here were given in Israel as gifts this past January.
About the artist: Sam Ganz Panzier is a quilter and fiber artist from New York.
THE CONTINUATION, Fortune Chalme
A note from the artist: "The Continuation," 2024 is a deeply personal self-portrait. In this work, I stand nine months pregnant with my fourth child, embodying strength and pride while reflecting on the generations of women who came before me and the life growing within me. The composition weaves together my Jewish, Egyptian, and Syrian experiences, drawing on the spiral of time and the power of tradition as we move forward. I wear a garment I created, hand-drawing 1,200 Jewish stars in memory of the victims brutally murdered on October 7. This garment is a testament to strength, resilience, and the enduring spirit of our people and our nation. "The Continuation" honors both the past and the future, celebrating the power of life and tradition as we carry forward our legacy.
About the artist: Fortune Chalme is an exhibiting artist and designer living in Oakhurst, New Jersey, with her husband and four children. She holds a BFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York City and has also studied at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem. Chalme’s practice moves between two interconnected bodies of work: her design practice in leather and her fine art practice, which often incorporates performative and meditative elements. Through her design work, she creates intricately laser-cut leather objects that reimagine traditional Jewish ritual items—including mezuzah cases, challah covers, matzah covers, and tallit and tefillin bags—as contemporary works of functional art. Alongside this design practice, Chalme’s fine art explores themes of identity, ritual, and spiritual reflection. Raised in the Jewish-Syrian community of Brooklyn, she frequently draws inspiration from the traditions, symbols, and rhythms of her upbringing. Her work investigates how cultural memory and Jewish identity can be expressed through gesture, repetition, and process. Many of Chalme’s works include a performative or contemplative aspect. She approaches the act of making as a meditative practice, viewing art itself as a form of prayer—an opportunity to slow down, reflect, and create moments of connection between tradition, spirituality, and contemporary life.
UNTITLED, AJ Grossman
A note from the artist: This quilt was started after the Oct 7, 2023 event in Israel. It was a way for me to heal as well as to document the atrocity.
About the artist: AJ Grossman is a painter and quilter whose work explores the dynamic interplay of lines, movement, and rhythm. A graduate of the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City with an AAS in Design, AJ began her creative journey in fashion illustration and design. This early career shaped her attention to detail and her fascination with pattern and structure, which continue to define her artistic practice. AJ’s lifelong obsession with lines and stripes is the driving force behind her work. She embraces the challenge of making order out of disorder, using line as a language to express direction, flow, and energy. Her process is both meticulous and intuitive: each piece begins with taped patterns that evolve organically, creating intricate designs that suggest motion or optical illusions. Through her art, AJ invites viewers to consider the transformative power of simple elements—lines and patterns—to create complex, engaging visual narratives.
UNTITLED, Karen Tintori
A note from the artist: I created and painted our son and daughter-in-law's chuppah on silk crepe, with verses and images they chose. L'dor vador, I incorporated both father's hands, joined in blessing above their heads.
About the artist: Karen Tintori is an internationally best-selling author of fiction and non-fiction whose novels have been translated into more than 25 languages and to film. Her books cover a wide range of the human experience, from the lives of Italian-American immigrants to the mysteries of the Kabbalah. With Jill Gregory, she penned two Jewish DaVinci Code thrillers, The Book of Names and The Illumination, SMP, and What Does Being Jewish Mean? Read-Aloud Responses to Questions Jewish Children Ask About History, Culture and Religion, a collaboration with Jan Greenberg and Rabbi E. B. Friedman, Simon & Schuster. Also a visual artist, she has designed and painted more than two dozen custom silk chuppot. She lives in a suburb of Detroit, Michigan. More at: www.karentintori.com
UNTITLED, Wendy Kaplan Friend
A note from the artist: This artwork confronts the persistence of antisemitism. The Hebrew phrase “Israel shall live” speaks to endurance and survival. The menorah represents continuity, memory, and light. These symbols are not targets—they are what endure. The act of stepping is directed at hatred itself. The shoe becomes a force against antisemitism, not against Jewish identity. This piece invites reflection on how symbols are read, misread, and challenged. Its message is direct: antisemitism must be actively opposed.
About the artist: Wendy Kaplan Friend is a multidisciplinary artist and welder whose expressive and dynamic sculptural works reflect a bold interplay between craft, material and story. Her art bridges industrial techniques with personal and cultural symbolism, resulting in installations that are equally powerful in form and in message. She has exhibited widely across New York, Los Angeles and Toronto, including at venues such as Culture Lab in Long Island City, the Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition and Makers Space in Brooklyn. ForestHall, Pennsylvania, Port Jervis Invitational, New York Her work was recently featured in SNAG Magazine and the ABANA Favorites of 2024 online exhibit. Wendy is also a life member of the Art Students League in Manhattan and a juried member of the National Association of Women Artists. Kaplan-Friend’s distinctive voice as an artist has earned her placement in private collections across the U.S., Canada and Israel and her work has been highlighted by PIX11 News, the Queens Chronicle and the West Side Rag and Pike County Chronicle for its relevance and impact.