Material/Inheritance: Contemporary Work by New Jewish Culture Fellows is a new exhibition featuring the work of 30 artists whose work has been supported by the New Jewish Culture Fellowship (NJCF), a national arts fellowship that advances the work of groundbreaking Jewish artists.

The artists featured in Material/Inheritance emphasize resilience in contemporary forms with inspiration from and foundations in ancestral Jewish texts, practices, histories and griefs. Performances on opening and closing weekends will catalyze audiences’ close engagement with their own intentions for their spiritual, political and creative lives, and how these might be supported by inherited structures. This work asks: what does the future hold, and how much of that is in our own hands? What do we need to survive, and where can we find it? How can we balance the needs of the individual and collective as we generate new solutions for contemporary and age-old questions? What does it look like to celebrate and rejoice alongside continual waves of mourning, discomfort and despair?

Material/Inheritance challenges genre and generic frames, specifically to consider the thinking and community that become possible in inter-disciplinary conversation. The artists showcased in Material/Inheritance engage forms from new media and live performance to painting, poetry, food and sculpture. In line with the framing of NJCF, this exhibition and series of performances will hold open the generative tension between process and product, modernity and tradition, comfortable and unknown. Works address subject matter including chosen and biological family, queer and trans identity, embodiment and sexuality, diasporic homes, ritual reinventions, archival modalities, activist movements, political histories, and radical possibilities for regenerative and inventive survival.

Material/Inheritance was developed by Leora Fridman, Curator-in-Residence, in partnership with staff and leadership of the Jewish Museum of Maryland and the New Jewish Culture Fellowship, and with guidance from our curatorial committee: Gregg Bordowitz, visual artist, critic, poet, performer, filmmaker, writer, scholar, and teacher; Kendell Pinkney, Black-Jewish theatremaker, creative producer, founding Artist Director of THE WORKSHOP, and rabbi ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary; Mónica Gomery, poet, rabbi at Kol Tzedek Synagogue and faculty of SVARA: A Traditionally Radical Yeshiva; and Heidi Rabben, Senior Curator at the Contemporary Jewish Museum.

The New Jewish Culture Fellowship (NJCF) is an interdisciplinary cohort of groundbreaking Jewish artists who study together and share creative work over the course of an academic year. Fellows come from all creative fields—visual arts, writing, performance, music, and more—and apply with projects that would benefit from the feedback and support of peers similarly drawn to exploring the rich, complex inheritance of Jewish life and identity in all its forms.

Our first three cohorts were made up of New York-based artists, but we're thrilled to announce that starting in 2022, artists from across the United States can apply to be NJCF fellows, as we make the learning component of our program primarily virtual. Fellows meet regularly with Rabbi Matt Green and Fellowship Director Maia Ipp, and in one-on-one (chevruta) pairings. They’re invited to propose classes or events that showcase their work—screenings, concerts, exhibitions, workshops, and more—to NJCF’s local and national audience. They receive support in the form of a fellowship stipend, accountability and feedback, advocacy and promotion, and access to a growing audience.

Since 2018, thirty-two fellows have participated in the program as part of three cohorts. They continue to engage with each other through our alumni network, and many NJCF fellows have developed ongoing professional collaborations.