Newly developed technique of painting pastel over photo printed on pastel pape

Portrait painting of my daughter Shanee who lives in Jerusalem in newly developed technique of painting pastel colors over a photo printed on pastel paper. Shanee, you made history.

A review for Battlefield Detectives " The Six day War".

 Looking back at history, April 12, 2012

By Jason Mark Alster M.Sc "Millenium man" (Wethersfield , CT)

This review is from: Battlefield Detectives: The Six-Day War (DVD)

When I was in the final days of sixth grade and in a Hebrew Academy in Hartford CT. I distinctively remember that everyone from Rabbi to teacher to students were afraid that Israel would be destroyed by the numerically larger Arab nations. The UN had just been ordered by Egypt to leave the Sinai and Nasser and other Arab leaders proudly proclaimed on the news in public that they were about to " wipe Israel into the sea". The sight of Arab soldiers in mass doing the Goose Step march was a reminder to the Third Reich. The sight of mass demonstrations in the Arab cities calling praise for Nasser's proclamation to destroy Israel are still in my memory. Synagogues were having special prayers to pray for Israel , and this to the Jewish generation trying to rebuild itself just 22 years after the Holocaust. Then on June 5th at 8 AM in the morning when I was getting ready to go to school I heard on the radio that Israel had just destroyed the combined Arab air force with a pre-emptive strike and was conquering the Sinai. HOW did that happen. From pure fear to shock and celebration. It really was a secret because at the time Israel for security reasons told very little of her military operations and strategy. Looking at Israel today, now an important strategic ally of the USA, it is not hard to understand that the Six Day War was one of the most game changing events in history. How Israel won this war had to be told. Battlefield detectives did a good job , because with all the propaganda around, the truth still shines in the darkness. I lived in Israel for 20 years and can tell you that most Israelis did not even know what Battlefield Detectives revealed. Leaving Home, Going Home, Returning Home: A Hebrew American's Sojourn in the Land of Israel

AVDAT ruins - used to demonstrate new painting technique

Hi everyone,
I am happy to announce that I developed a new method of art and art teaching. This will especially help people with dysgraphia enjoy painting, but even senior citizens, or young artists. You know that artists will take a complicated to draw photo and project it on a wall or canvas and trace it in black charcoal pencil, then paint over it. Other artists use mixed media water colors as a base paint then paint over it with pastels allowing some of the water color to show through leaving a luminous effect. Well what I did was print a color photograph on pastel paper in my printer and then with pastels pencil or stick paint over the photo. The end product is a beautiful original painting with some color of the photo showing through as if it was a pastel painting with water color showing through. The combined easy to paint without learning to draw effect is just beautiful.

Below is a painting of the Nabatean city of Advat , the same view of the photo on the delicious Israeli wine ADVAT.

Epilogue: The Passover Seder from the book Leaving Home ....

Epilogue: The Passover Seder

When and how does an artist know when the painting they are painting

is done? There are a couple of methods to making this call, and

they happen to be very similar for completing a book. For one, your

intuition may just tell you it’s done. Or, you no longer find yourself

inspired by the work, and thus find yourself unmotivated or unwilling

to continue adding content. You may take up the option to put

the work down for awhile and come back to it later with new insight

and knowledge for resolving snags. But, if you return and continue

to feel the same way, perhaps it’s time to polish that project up and

start another anew.

I have debated much about when to end this book searching for

just the right way to go about finding that proper ending. What I

thought would take six months actually took three years. Most of

this book was written in eight months, but then newer ideas would

come and older memories that had to be retold resurfaced. I started

telling people I had written a book on my life in Israel and it would

be ready in a few months. I figured that if I made it a public announcement,

it would be so, but as I write this epilogue, I have to

admit that was over a year ago. I was still enjoying memories that

this project conjured up, and I wanted to remember more and write

more. To truly help bring the project to a close, I began to read

chapters to friends. I really felt I accomplished something when a

friend let me read the chapters to him for a second time. So at last, 

the time came. I laid out the ultimatum for myself

that any more stories would have to wait for a sequel, and that’s

that. The process of ending the book had begun, but how long it

would take and how the process would turn out remained a mystery.

I decided to meet with my nephew Jeremy Yanofsky, who by now

graduated with an English major in college, and I asked him to help

me to edit this book. I chose to ask Jeremy to help me in particular

not just because of his expertise in writing and not just because he

was my nephew, but also because I surmised that he may have some

unique insight into the relationships I had between myself, Israel,

and the USA, specifically because he had the opportunity to visit

Israel via the Taglit-Birthright Israel program. According to their

webpage, Birthright has provided gifts of first time educational trips

to Israel so as to “strengthen the sense of solidarity among world

Jewry” and to strengthen the “participant’s personal Jewish identity.”

After partaking in this trip, Jeremy happened to take advantage and

visit me when I still lived in Zichron Yacov, making him a bit more

familiar with the subject at hand.

The opportune moment for completing the story ironically arrived

on the night of the Passover Seder, April 2009, during which

Jews around the world spent the evening commemorating freedom

and redemption from bondage. My sister Audrey, Jeremy’s Mom,

invited me to her house for this Seder, where we all read passages

from the Haggadah, retelling the story of how the Israelites were led

from bondage and Egypt by Moses at the behest of the Lord. As

the story goes, the Israelites leave havoc behind and wander in the

Sinai wilderness on their way to entering the Promised Land. On

my way to my sister’s home, I stop in a local wine and spirits store,

and I find it stocked with kosher wines from Israel, Spain, Italy,

France, New York and California. I picked up a few bottles, one of

them containing dry white wine but in a green bottle. At the counter,

a woman asks me if I was buying green wine, and I told her it

was regular white wine in a green bottle shipped in from Israel. She

asked me if it was any good, to which I replied of course – I lived in

Israeli wine country for ten years, I should know. I felt like a good

will ambassador for Israel.

Audrey invited seventeen friends along to her house, most of

which I had become acquainted with by this time. From the conversations

around the Seder plate, I gathered that some of these people

wanted their children to go to Israel like my nephew did. Some

were planning to go, but did not yet. Others did not have any plans

to ever go, but wished they did. Several said they are going to go

when the time is right, but remorsefully settled on the idea that they

probably won’t. One person even happened to be brought as a child

from Israel to live here in America. This Seder was on the second

night of Passover. In Israel, Jewish celebrations and observances like

the Passover Seder last only one night, but out in the world of the

Diaspora, the age-old custom of extending certain holidays with

an added night to ensure that the timing of one’s observance of

the holiday properly aligned with the timing of the holiday in the

Promised Land was still in practice. While this practice may have

been necessary in post-Biblical times, it just seems like an obsolete

concept in the age of the Internet, especially to someone who has

celebrated these occasions right in Israel just fine without adding

that extra evening.

The day began with frost on the ground. I mention this because

Israel is sunny this time of year and the depictions of the

stories of Passover in my sister’s Haggadah are all bright and sunny.

There are palm trees and a warm, blue, Nile with people wading

in the waters to extract the baby Moses from his reed basket. The

pyramids and sand dunes bask in the sun. Egyptians and Israelites

pose in light cotton clothes, wearing hats for shade, working in the

fields to reap a hay harvest to use in making bricks for Egyptian

buildings. Gazing at these pictures in the Haggadah, I wondered

if I was drawn to that part of the world to get away from the cold

New England winters. Glancing at the news that day, 

I read that President Barack Obama

was having a Passover Seder in the White House, marking the first

ever for an American president. Of course, editorials in the Jewish

newspapers were ripe with “See, we told you so, Obama is good

for the Jews.” Listening to the reading of the Haggadah around our

Seder table of how the Hebrews were slaves in Egypt and how they

longed to be free, I couldn’t help but wonder about the universality

of the message of longing for freedom. What reaction would

President Obama hold regarding the story? I would presume that he

could not help but consider the parallels to black slavery, bondage,

and redemption in America’s history and perhaps compare Moses

to Abraham Lincoln. Was Obama now going to be a black Moses

of sorts, redeeming America from her economic and social troubles?

Are we going to a new promised future and a new promised land?

Much remained uncertain about the future of America and Israel

alike that night, but in reading the Haggadah with my family, I was

certain of at least one truth in my life. I no longer felt like the son

of a refugee, or a minority citizen, or a fish out of its aquarium, I

felt free and content. I was able to follow my dream. This year, Jews

were invited to a genuine kosher for Passover White House dinner

through the front door. The Jewish people now had a homeland

under an Israeli sun; and with it a thriving culture to be proud of, a

strong army, strong allies, and a beautiful lady model on the front

page of Sports Illustrated. As the traditional conclusion of the Haggadah

meets its readers with the blessing “next year in Jerusalem,” so

may this blessing come true for you someday.