On April 17 Hillel at Emory opened its newest art exhibit featuring the work of Yitzchok Moully, the self-proclaimed Pop Art Rabbi. Moully incorporates aspects of his religion and his colorful background to create art reminiscent of a Jewish Andy Warhol. Raised by former hippies, Moully grew up surrounded by color and promotion of self expression.

The new exhibit of original works by Salvador Dali called "Aliyah, the Rebirth of Israel" opened on Thursday to great acclaim. Dali expert and guest curator of the recent exhibit at The High Museum, "Dali: The Late Works," Elliott King, presented an insightful commentary on Dali's life and works to an audience of students, faculty and community.

King described the images in the Aliyah suite as reflecting a kind of "defiance" in portraying the rebirth of Israel.

“These images of defiance reflect the resiliency of the Jewish people -- of not only surviving but thriving against all odds,” Hillel Director Michael Rabkin said. “The kind of vibrancy that we see in Dali's paintings captures the essence of that resilience and vibrancy even today in our community in Atlanta and America and also Israel.”

Opher Aviran, the Consul General of Israel to the Southeastern U.S. - one of the primary sponsors of the exhibit - joined in opening the exhibit. College senior, Sarah Green, an art history major and president of Emory Students for Israel (ESI), introduced Elliott King. ESI included the opening of the Dali exhibit as part of their "Israel Peace Week" initiative at Emory.

Emory Professor David Blumenthal opened the event with a stirring recollection of how he came to acquire this suite of lithographs. From the article in today's Emory Wheel:

Blumenthal started the reception with the romantic story of how he came by the lithographs. When he and his wife were dating, he took her to a museum in New York to see a Dalí Exhibit.

“Two years later, in 1967, Dalí was working on a series of pieces of art on the theme of Zionism, the theme of the rebirth of Israel,” Blumenthal said.

His wife, Ursula, bought the set for him in the early 1980s. Until now, it had remained in its original box under their piano. It wasn’t until last spring that Ursula decided these pieces would make a great complement to The High Museum of Art’s “Dalí: the Late Work” exhibition and would also serve as a way to honor the new Hillel Center.

“It is what I, as a professor of Jewish studies, consider to be the fusion, in the finest sense of the word, of Jewish civilization and the humanities in general,” Blumenthal said.

The exhibit is on display at the Marcus Hillel Center until June 2011. An audio guide, which can be downloaded for free from iTunes U to an iPhone or iPod Touch, is available with commentary on each of the 25 framed lithographs. For more information, visit www.emoryhillel.org/dali.

Photos from the opening are after the break.

On Monday, Jewish Canadian musician, producer and self-proclaimed Klezmer-Hip Hop maestro, Socalled visited Emory. Socalled mixes old Yiddish records with hip-hop beats and the brightest international artists. He’s created a modern and distinctive sound that had students moving in their seats.

Socalled sat down with Jake Krakovsky from Emory’s WMRE radio and music professor Dr. Matt Miller to discuss his Klezmer-Hip Hop invention. Socalled is an animated and talkative artist eager to tell you exactly what Klezmer is. He likens it to the Duke Ellingtons and Count Basies of Jewish culture, a genre he laments may be falling off of the radar since many young Jews have never heard of it.

“I guess I’m a missionary trying rile you up and make you a little interested about your own funky, interesting culture –it’s there if you want it,” he said.

Russell Gotschalk (C'07), an Atlanta-born musician, filmmaker and producer, is taking the Atlanta Jewish cultural scene by storm. A Hillel-organized Birthright Israel trip in winter 2006-07 inspired Russell to get more involved in the Jewish community. During his senior year, he began to work for the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival and continued working there post-graduation. A die-hard music lover, Russell noticed a major cultural gap in Jewish Atlanta: where was the music?

In 2009, Russell established the Atlanta Jewish Music Festival (AJMF), which launched in June 2010 with a sold-out live show featuring four oustanding Jewish music groups at the Apache Cafe in downtown Atlanta.

During the development of AJMF, Emory Hillel director Michael Rabkin asked Russell to take on a special project that would bring fresh and hip Jewish music to our local college campuses and begin to raise visibility for AJMF in the community.

Thanks to a special grant from the Charles & Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation and support from the Consulate General of Israel to Atlanta, Hillels of Georgia hosted an Israel hip-hop & raggae duo for a two-month residency this past spring. AXUM, the latest international musical sensation out of Israel, is the collaboration of two young Jewish Israelis: Tedross, an Ethiopian Israeli and Judah, a Yemenite-Moroccan Israeli. They have taken the Tel Aviv dancehall scene by storm and have even appeared in a recent promo for a popular Israeli TV show.

Russell served as AXUM's manager during their extended music residency booking them gigs at Emory and other campuses, local clubs, public schools, and parties. There was rarely a night they weren't working. And during the day, Russell had them in the studio collaborating with local musicians.

To cap it off, Russell, whose production company is called Rusky Productions, shot a video for AXUM's song, "War inna Babylon," and set it to visually stunning Atlanta backdrops. AXUM joined Athens-based raggae band DubConscious in the studio in Atlanta to record the track, remixed the vocals in Tel Aviv, and sent the final track to Russell to put to his emotionally charged video back in Atlanta for a truly global Jewish music experience.

Take a look at the final cut after the break, and learn more about the Atlanta Jewish Music Festival.