Nov 12 – Feb 12 2018
Opening Event   Tuesday, November 20 | 7 – 9 PM
@ Makom – 402 College St

Curator: Evelyn Tauben

Collaged photographs and drawings that mine childhood memories, reflecting the volatility of nature, community and identity

Multi-disciplinary artist Lynne Heller creates an original, layered installation for the FENTSTER window gallery. The exhibition draws upon recollections from her childhood at Camp Naivelt (Yiddish for “New World”), a summertime family retreat in Brampton focused on secularist, socialist values, activism, and a celebration of Jewish and Yiddish culture. This haven of radical politics was the centre of Heller’s Jewish community as she was raised in a gentile area of Toronto where her Jewish background set her apart. As the child of a Jewish father and an Anglo-Protestant mother, Heller felt a sense of displacement in many settings. This experience of dislocation is explored in the installation through a poignant early memory of visiting Naivelt in the spring off-season to find the property covered with enormous ice floes ejected from the thawing Credit River that runs through the camp. The massive ice blocks appeared both organic and oddly unnatural. Similarly, Heller felt both integrated into the Naivelt community during the 1960s and 70s and also felt different in that milieu given her mixed heritage. Combining original photographs, drawings and renderings of that eerie frozen terrain, large-scale pictures hold out the promise of a new world, one that bridges seemingly distinct realms.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Lynne Heller is a post-disciplinary artist, designer, educator and academic. Her interests encompass material culture, new media performative interaction, graphic novels and sculptural installation. Heller completed her MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her PhD at University College Dublin. Her research was practice-based with a specialty in Digital Media Arts and Feminist Studies. She is an Adjunct Professor at OCAD University and an Associate Member of the Graduate Faculty. Heller is co-director of the Data Materialization Lab at OCAD University. She is also an adjunct faculty member of SMARTlab, Ireland. Heller has an extensive exhibition record both nationally and internationally.

with Guest Rabbi David Seidenberg
This Saturday, Nov 3
5:30-7pm
@ Makom
FREE
Please RSVP

In keeping with Izhbitz hasidic custom, our seudah shelishit – third meal of Shabbat – will focus more on feeding our souls than our bodies, so we’ll eat only a morsel and keep speech to a minimum. As the sun sets and night falls, we’ll learn deep hasidic teachings and sing our way higher through soulful niggunim (wordless melodies). We’ll then conclude Shabbat with a musical havdalah.

Rabbi David Seidenberg is the creator of neohasid.org and the author of Kabbalah and Ecology: God’s Image in the More-Than-Human World. He brings not only expertise in science (ecology, cosmology, and astronomy) and texts (midrash, Talmud, philosophy, Kabbalah, and Chasidus), but also engagement with spirit (mysticism, meditation, davening, and nigunim), embodiment, and ritual. He was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary and Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi. One of the foremost Jewish eco-theologians, David is also a liturgist and translator, and an avid singer and dancer.

Tuesday, Nov 6
7:30pm – 9pm 
@ Makom
Suggested Donation $10 – $20
Register HERE 

Scholar Rabbi Alan Brill will explore a variety of Jewish meditation techniques in comparison to Hinduism – especially the philosophies of Yoga and Tantra – with particular interest in similar meditations between the two traditions, including candle and lights, equanimity, mantra, visualizing great beings, and reaching Nothingness.

Rabbi Alan Brill is the Chair for Jewish-Christian Studies at Seton Hall University, where he teaches Jewish studies in the graduate program. He is the author of Thinking God: The Mysticism of Rabbi Zadok of Lublin (2002), Judaism and Other Religions: Models Of Understanding (2010), and Judaism and World Religions (2012). Dr. Brill received his BA, MA, and Rabbinical Ordination from Yeshiva University and his PhD from Fordham University. He was a Fulbright Senior Scholar awardee to research and teach at Banares Hindu University in Varanasi, India. Dr. Brill just completed a book tentatively entitled Rabbi on The Ganges: A Jewish-Hindu Encounter. He is active in the Jewish interfaith encounter with Catholics, Muslims, and Hindus.

Friday, Oct 26
6:00pm – Doors Open; 6:15pm – Services Start
@ Makom
$20 for Adult Dinner Ticket; $12 for kids 1-10 (25% off for Makom Members)

Registration Required for dinner by Tues, Oct 23

Celebrate Shabbat with spirit! Wind down from the week and welcome Shabbat with soulful, song-filled services, in which everyone can participate. After services, we’ll enjoy a delicious, catered vegan Shabbat dinner together. Very limited space; register now.

8 Sundays, Oct 14 – Dec 2
10-11am
@ Makom – 402 College St
$65 for the series
Register here

Looking for something to do with your toddler on the weekend?

PJ Plus is where the fun of a play date meets the value of Jewish family education. Join us for Hands-On Jewish Fun, an interactive PJ story circle time, arts and crafts, music and movin’, snack and schmoozin’!

For 2-3 year olds + Parent or Grandparent

4 Tuesdays, Oct 9-30
11am-1pm
@ 65 Harbour Sq (Queen’s Quay W & York St)
$100 for the series
Registration Required

What comes after the Torah? Over only four sessions, we’ll overview and discuss the Book of Joshua from a great variety of perspectives: ancient and modern, traditional and academic, literary and historical, etc.

No prior Jewish study or Hebrew knowledge required. Contact Rabbi Aaron for more info and to register.

Monday, Oct 1
8:30pm
@ Wolfond Centre – 36 Harbord St

Makom and Annex Shul are coming together to celebrate Simhat Torah – the completion and renewing of the annual Torah-reading cycle – with joyous evening services and hakafot (singing & dancing with the Torah). All ages welcome!

B.Y.O.B. – see this handy list of kosher alcoholic beverages.
We’ll provide sweet & savoury snacks.

Sponsors Needed! Help sponsor food & drinks; contact Rabbi Aaron asap to pitch in.
Thanks to Sunflower Kitchen for sponsoring hummus and other yummy dips.

We’ll have men’s, women’s, and mixed-gender sections for services and hakafot. Both women and men will participate in leading hakafot, reading Torah, and being called up to the Torah.

Thursday, Sep 6
7-8:30pm
@ Makom
$5-20 (sliding scale) at the door

The month of Elul preceding the High Holidays invites us to draw closer to God. Come sing joyful chants and weave together harmonies that will help us notice our connections to each other and the Divine before we enter the introspection of the High Holidays.

All are welcome, no musical or Hebrew experience necessary.

Rachel Brown has offered singing workshops in a variety of settings including Aleph Kallah, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Reclaiming Tradition – a Shabbaton for young Jewish adults. She has offered adult education classes in chanting at Kol Tzedek Synagogue in Philadelphia, where she serves on the board. In 2014 she completed the Kol Zimra Chant Leadership training with Rabbi Shefa Gold.

Co-sponsored by Annex Shul and Danforth Jewish Circle

Join us for Makom’s amazing Rosh Hashanah (Sept 10-11) and Yom Kippur (Sept 18-19) services, family services, childcare, and chanting!

Info and tickets here.  Become a Makom Member first and save even more (10% off) while you help support your downtown Jewish community.

(High Holiday ticket sales help cover the costs of putting on High Holiday services and are fully tax deductible. We don’t want anyone to be unable to attend services due to financial constraints. We offer student/low income tickets; if you need additional financial consideration, please contact Rabbi Aaron in confidence. All are welcome!)

Makom is an inclusive community that welcomes participants who espouse many different approaches to Judaism, from secular to religiously liberal to traditionally observant. In order to join together as one community without regard to denominational labels, our main services blend traditional and progressive practices. We’ll offer men’s, women’s, and mixed-seating sections in our main services; children are welcome in all sections. Both men and women will participate in leading services, reading Torah and haftarah, and being called up for aliyot to the Torah. Family Services are egalitarian with mixed seating.

Services will be led by Rabbi Aaron and special guest prayer leaders, whom we’ll announce soon.

We’re looking forward to an incredible start of 5779 together with you!

Co-presented with Kulanu Toronto and Moishe House Toronto