Mayer July in Second Life, Second Chance

For those of you who missed the opening of the "Mayer July" exhibition in the Tachles Gallery, you have a second chance to meet Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, daughter of the artist Mayer Kirshenblatt, to talk about her father's work.

Tomorrow, 10:30 EST (7:30 SLT), she will join from Warsaw again to present the virtual exhibition to an audience in New York.

Some general information about tomorrow's event can be found on Barbara's blog.

The event will be hosted in New York by the NYU Center for Religion and Media. So come on and join, you will be prominently featured on the big screen for a RL audience in New York.

There is also a review of the exhibition opening on the Westmuse blog.

10 Days/10 Questions

A friend of mine sent me an invitation to join 10Q, a project launched for the time between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.

10 Days. 10 Questions. You answer one question per day in your own secret online 10Q space. At the end of the ten days, you hit a magic button and send your answers to the secure online 10Q vault for safekeeping. One year later, the vault will open and your answers will wing their way back to your email inbox for private reflection.

An interesting and creative project to reflect in the Days of Awe.

In-world, also an interesting project was brought to our attention. Yula Finesmith made a freebie earring for Rosh Hashanah and wanted to let everyone know they can have it.

Interested, then contact Yula. I am sure she is happy to hear from you.

Shana Tova 5770

Dancing Rabbis

Yesterday, when I couldn't sleep, I flipped through my TV channels and what did I see? Dancing Hasids! Yes, guys like the one you can see here on my left, even if this one is virtual.
What I witnessed was the Chabad Telethon. I never watched a Telethon and for those of you who are not American, a Telethon is a very American experience, a little bit of shopping channel, a little bit of light entertainment ("Borsht Belt humor"), and everything about fundraising. Last year, the Chabad Telethon brought in over eight million dollars. This year's results are not out yet.
The Chabad Telethon is a real American experience, and it attracks not only Jews. Having this event on television underlines (at least to me) how all American orthodox Jews are, and it seems not strange to have them dance on the streets of Los Angeles to raise money for welfare programs.
In-world, even if not that visible, Jews are also part of main stream Second Life culture. You don't believe this? Well, I do. If you look at the membership of the Second Life Synagogue, you'll see that over 1,000 avatars joined the group. Yes, I know, not everyone is still in-world, maybe some avatars belong to the same RL person, etc., but this is true for any group, and if you compare SLS with other religious groups, you will see that not so many (if any) can proudly state that they have over 1,000 people registered.
As the founder of SLS, Beth Odets (Brown in RL) has been featured in many interviews and was recently at the Second Life convention in San Francisco. NPR, the American National Public Radio, had two years ago an interesting story about Online Religion and she was one of the people interviewed. In case you missed it, here a link. Even if nearly two years old, many things could have been said just yesterday.

Mayer July exhibition to open at Tachles Gallery

The New York Times called him "a reluctant painter and accidental memoirist whose words and images form an extraordinary exhibition".

And this exhibition is now coming into Second Life.

The artist, Mayer Kirshenblatt, was born in Opatow (in Yiddish Apt), Poland in 1916 and left for Canada in 1934. At the age of 73 he taught himself to paint and made his mission to remember the world of his childhood in living color, lest future generations know more about how Jews died than how they lived.

This unique project is a blend of memoir, oral history, and visual interpretation. Intimate, humorous, and refreshingly candid, the project is a remarkable record -- in both words and images -- of Jewish life in a Polish town before World War II, as seen through the eyes of an inquisitive boy.

So far, the images have been shown in in Berkeley/San Francisco, in Kirshenblatt's hometown Opatow in Poland, and are currently at the Jewish Museum in New York and the Galicia Jewish Museum in Krakow, Poland. In December, part of his artwork will be show in Amsterdam.

And now "They Called Me Mayer July" will come into Second Life.

The opening will take place in the 2Life Building (Tachles Gallery) in Nessus at 11 AM SLT.

Those who are either in New York or Warsaw, will have even a chance to join the opening in RL.

In New York, 2Life Magazine organizes a get-together for the opening, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, the daughter of the artist, will join from Poland.

We're back... somehow

Rosh Hashana is around the corner and you might wonder if there is another issues of 2Life magazine.

The bad news: There won't be a Rosh Hashana edition of 2Life.

The good news: 2Life magazine is continuing (for the moment) in blog form.

Having a blog has the advantage that the news are more immediate. What happens right now in Second Life can be minutes later already on this blog.

Yes, we know, we loved the nicely magazine layout, but you know how it is. Times are tough, money does not grow on trees, etc.

Hope you enjoy the blog. If you have any comments and suggestions, write us to 2lifemagazine@gmail.com