The inaugural event at the Contemporary Arts Center Gallery at UC Irvine’s Claire Trevor School of the Arts was the US premiere of Yael Bartana’s trilogy ... and Europe will be stunned. The three video bring to life an imagined narrative of history through a call for the Jews to return to Poland and the subsequent Jewish renaissance in Poland. The videos, originally displayed in the Polish Pavilion in the 54th Venice Biennale aesthetically references propaganda films of the 1930s, which, when presented as a gallery installation, collectively deconstruct a group of ideological positions that contributed to the founding of Israel: European antisemitism, colonialism, socialism, and Zionism. At once ironic and serious, the work urges the viewer to consider the social mandate of a Jewish Homeland from contradictory perspectives.

The exhibition included a one-day conference titled “Jewish Renaissance Movement in Poland (JRMiP)” on Saturday, February 4, 2012, at the Claire Trevor School of the Arts Contemporary Arts Center. With Keynote speaker Galit Eilat, moderated by Nizan Shaked, and with speakers Yael Bartana, Gil Hochberg, Yuval Kremnitzer, and Sławomir Sierakowski.