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Nimoy’s `Shekhina’ photos upset Jewish community
February 20, 2003
By Jan Sjostrom, Cox News Service.
PALM BEACH, Fla. — Shouts filled the temple. The Orthodox Jewish priests were bestowing the high holiday blessing.
In the congregation was an 8-year-old boy. His father had told him he must not look up. But he could not resist. Raising his eyes, he saw the priests making a V-shaped hand gesture.
The image burned itself into his memory. It came out 27 years later, when Leonard Nimoy introduced the Vulcan hand salute in the original “Star Trek” television series. Nimoy played Spock in the series and in six feature films.
The memory resurfaced again in Nimoy’s photographic series “Shekhina.” The series, which occupied the photographer for eight years, is collected in a book, published by Umbrage Editions in October. Many of the photographs are at the Armory Art Center in West Palm Beach.
Years after “Star Trek” became a cult favorite, Nimoy learned that the ritual he was forbidden to observe invoked Shekhina, the feminine manifestation of God. The V-shaped hand gesture represents the Hebrew character shin, the first letter of Shekhina’s name.
Mystical tradition
According to Jewish mystical tradition, she is so awesome that humans might not survive the sight of her. The revelation gave direction to work Nimoy was doing with the female form.
His photographs attempt to capture the goddess, Nimoy said,
Looking well-tailored, lean and youthful, Nimoy, 71, said, “I decided to explore, if possible, everything I could think of about the feminine experience, including pregnancy and birth.”
Most of the photographed figures are nude or partially nude. The models often wear filmy robes, and sometimes prayer shawls or phylacteries, a prayer accessory that wraps around one arm.
The black-and-white images are marked by strong contrasts in lights and darks. The figures appear in natural settings, framed by woods, sea or sky, or in an indeterminate zone inhabited only by their bodies and the light.
Nimoy says he uses light in the same way that Old Masters such as Rembrandt did. The light-dark dichotomy relates to poles such as good and evil and materialism versus spirituality, he said.
The photographs have incensed some Jewish leaders, who object to his adorning female nudes with Jewish ritual objects. In Seattle and Detroit, his appearances for Jewish organizations were canceled. The events were relocated to other venues, where they were well-attended, he said.
Nimoy said he was “nonplussed” by the cancellations. “Because one or two loud voices were raised, several hundred people who wanted to see my work were being told they couldn’t,” he said.
Nimoy speculated that the objections to his work may stem from attitudes about the proper place of women in Judaism. “It’s all about territory,” he said. “The book has been seen as elevating women in the hierarchy. In Judaism, certain males are not comfortable with that.”
Rabbi Isaac Jeret, spiritual leader of Temple Emanu-El in Palm Beach, has not seen Nimoy’s work. But, he said, “it would be unfair to characterize any denomination or practice as more or less egalitarian based on whether or not they approve of Mr. Nimoy’s work.”
There were no objections from the 400 people who turned out to hear Nimoy’s talk at Temple Israel in West Palm Beach, said Howard Shapiro, the temple’s rabbi.
“People who came and saw his art, especially when they saw the images at the Armory, were quite taken by the power of the photographs,” he said.
Nor has the Armory received any complaints, said Amelia Ostrosky, executive director. The 100 guests at the reception “didn’t think it was at all offensive,” she said. “They understood the interpretation and were very impressed by it.”
Book selling well
The book, his first photographic monograph, is selling well.
The 6,000-copy first edition has been succeeded by a 4,000-volume second edition. The artist is represented by galleries in New York and Los Angeles.
Nimoy learned photography in his teens. In the 1970s, burned out from his television and movie work, he resumed his studies and considered switching careers to commercial photography.
In addition to his on-camera work, Nimoy has directed several films, including two “Star Trek” features, “The Good Mother” and “Three Men and a Baby.”
He and his wife, Susan, have homes in Los Angeles, Lake Tahoe and New York. Susan was the model for some of the “Shekhina” images, including the book’s final photograph of a woman’s upturned face.
Nimoy said he is finished with the “Shekhina” series. His next project may be even more abstract than documenting an invisible deity.
“I’m considering an essay on the subject of time,” he said.
“I’m in the final phase of my life. I’m told by actuarial tables that I have 5,642 days left to live.
“I’ve got myself a countdown clock that will tick down my days for me. I find it exhilarating to mark that time so that I use it, explore it and value it. If I’m conscious of it, I’m less likely to let it slip by unnoticed.”
Link
To learn more about this exhibit and to see more of Nimoy’s images, go to my article, “Remembering Leonard Nimoy, The Photographer”.