Rupture and Return

Book Design
Image-Making
2020

Curation, edit, and design of a book presenting the essay “Rupture and Return” by Ella Shohat, a professor of cultural studies. The essay discusses the representation of the history and identity of Mizrahi Jews, as reflected in Israeli cinema. The book includes movie frames I curated from movies mentioned in the essay. According to Shohat, the Aliyah to Israel created a rupture in the Mizrachi identity. To fit in, they had to forget their previous life and erase their cultural identity. There was no legitimacy to feel longing or to wish to return to their homeland. They were still in the middle east but in somewhat a parallel reality.

I divided the book into six chapters, following the original six parts of the essay describing the broken Mizrachi narrative: dislocation, displacement, dismemberment, dis-chronicity, dissonance, disciplining. These terms, describing different actions of manipulated sequence, emphasize the ability of cinema to represent and create manipulations on time, space and identity.

Stav Breuer