Israeli Art and the Clerical Institution

The complex relationship between the clerical and political organizations of the country in all matters relating to the public exhibition of art is a unique aspect of the Jewish-Israeli art. From the First Generation of C. E. By 1948 Jewish spiritual leaders expressed a number of interpretations of the supposed limitations of "graven images" contained in the biblical Second Commandment. During certain periods of history, Jewish spiritual leaders granted permission to create visual images and even to support them; they opposed them in other times and circumstances.

Although (in sporadic cases) the Israeli political establishment used to turn to Jewish clerics for expertise in the proper use of certain visual images, it in most cases decided against its public exhibition. Although Jewish spiritual leaders in the Diaspora only imposed their views on Jewish public institutions in local Jewish communities (synagogues, cemeteries, public baths, etc), Israel's Jewish ministers in Palestine and later Israel frequently allowed the display of works of art in secular public bodies and in public spaces to be restricted.

With regard to government-sponsored public commissions, Israel's artists face restrictions as well as the visual images they pretend to use in their works. They are also interfered by political as well as religious-clerical institutions. The government supports and does not support other artists' styles and works. The past of the visual arts in Palestine and Israel is marked by frequent conflicts between two polar approaches to the visual arts, artists and theoreticians who work towards modern, secular Jewish art, and the continuing fear of potential transgressions by Israel-Jews.