For years, we the jewelers in Israel have been like odd birds in the local creative landscape. We envied creators from other fields who had galleries, websites, and magazines. Therefore, it was only natural that alongside the establishment of the Association for Contemporary Jewelry in Israel, we founded a magazine that would be a home for creators in our field.
We chose to call it “Litushim” (Polishing) – a name that reflects the meticulous and precise craftsmanship inherent to jewelry-making, while also hinting at linguistic refinement. Our goal is for Litushim to become a textual space where language enriches material and material evokes language; a space where words merge with concrete forms, which, in turn, are given names that strive toward tangible understanding of ideas.
In these challenging times, with the war raging next to, above and within us, we hold on to hope that everyone will return home and that the time will come for repair, healing, fellowship, and peace – a fertile ground for creation and cultural discours.
In editing the magazine, we focused on objects that are intimately connected to the body, allowing small objects to take up meaningful space in the world, far beyond their physical dimensions. Jewelry pieces are typically small items worn on the body, while other crafted objects, such as tools and decorative pieces, may occupy larger spaces, yet their size often relates to the body of the wearer or user. Over the past year, we have witnessed the power of these small objects to express the emotions of an entire community – the next issue will explore this theme.
We chose to open the first issue with a general review of exhibitions presented over the past year: Katya Ravey reviews the graduate exhibitions of the Jewelry (and Fashion) departments at Bezalel and Shenkar; Naama Ben Porat shares her experience exhibiting for the first time at Talente, part of Schmuck, the international handcraft fair in Munich; Naama Levit discusses a jewelry exhibition on tools that she co-curated in New York, which revolves around spoons – the first and last eating tool used by humans.
The upcomingsecond issue will focus on memory and pain. In April, the third issue will explore the theme of markets. The final issue of the year will address themes that intersect with creation. Our goal is to publish 3-4 issues a year, with each one dedicated to a specific theme and featuring around three original articles relevant to both the local and global creative fields.The entire magazine will be available on the website of the Association for Contemporary Jewelry in Israel in both Hebrew and English.If you wish to propose original manuscripts aligned with the mentioned themes, you are welcome to contact us via email at: litushim.magazine@gmail.com
Since all work on the magazine is done voluntarily, we would like to extend our gratitude to everyone who has contributed to transforming this small vision from an idea into a reality.”
