PICTURE EXHIBITION: "ROOTS II"

The "Roots II" picture exhibition opened on 22 October 1998 at the Ramat Gan
Museum of Jewish Art, mounted by Mr. Eli Lavi, in cooperation with the Babylonian
Jewry Museum.
The exhibition showed paintings executed by three Baghdad-born artists, each
of them with an interesting life story to tell both from the personal and professional
aspect.
They are Eli Sawdayi, Salim Kadury, and Nissim Zalait.
The exhibition afforded a glimpse into the life of the Jews of Iraq, evoking
childhood memories permeated with aromas, shadings, and colors, for the most part
nostalgic, but also traumatic, such as the Shavuot massacre (the Farhud) in 1941.
The exhibition reflected three principal aspects:
a. Childhood memories of Eli Sawdayi depict family life in the traditional Jewish home.
His paintings acquaint the viewer with the rooms of the house where special and
interesting scenes were enacted. For example, the inhabitants of the house are seen in
the central courtyard (the hosh) listening to a troupe of musicians who have come
there during the Purim holiday. From the pictures one may also learn about the
cooking and the type of food that characterized the Jewish kitchen. The women usually
sat on wooden seats (takht) around a low round table as they prepared the typical
foods of Jewish cuisine in Iraq. In his pictures Sawdayi also shows the pantries where
comestibles were preserved in large pots, such as vinegar, spices, date syrup(silan),
and various cheeses. It was also usual to fill pot containers with water, which
evaporated through apertures in the pot and dripped into a bowl placed below the
vessel. The water in the bowl was pure and cool.
Sawaydi portrays the process of making date syrup, which on the Pessah
festival was used in the hilleq paste (haroset). A wooden press was used to crush the
dates and the juice was collected in basins (picture 1).
The family circle on winter days is depicted by Sawdayi as grandmother and
her grandchildren sitting cosily around the kursi jafuf (picture 2). This is a brazier set
on a copper tray and covered by a wooden stool. A blanket is spread over it, and as
they warm their feet they listen to fascinating stories from grandmother.
Sawdayi also presents the rhythmic beat of cotton popping in a picture called
Titi Pampa. A craftsman was called to the house whose task it was to pop the cotton
that was taken out of the mattresses. He would pile them up in a great mound and
burst them by means of a bowstring and a wooden mallet. The beating of the mallet on
the bowstring burst the cotton, and imparted sound and rhythm to the action. Titi
refers to the rhythm of the mallet and pampa means cotton. In the picture Eli Sawdayi
shows himself as a child using the pile of mattresses as a trampoline.
Eli Sawdayi was born in Baghdad in 1929, and came to Israel in 1950. At the
age of 14 he took a correspondence course with the Washington School of Art. For
over 20 years he worked for the Motorola Company. He painted at every opportunity
that arose. In his retirement, Sawdayi spends much time painting.
b. Inscribed in the memory of the artist Salim Kadury were Jewish figures that he saw
when he went out of his house. For example, there was the cloth peddler in the market,
or a Jewish woman wrapped in an enveloping veil (izar) and veil (khiliyi) (picture 3).
Kadury depicts the chalghi, a group of Jewish musicians who performed for
Jews and Muslims at celebrations and ceremonies such as brit milah, bar-mitzvah, and
mainly weddings. Picture 4 shows the musicians playing kamanja (fiddle), santur, and
drums.
Shlomo (Salim) Kadury was born in Baghdad in 1909. As a child he took part
in a painting competition at his school, and won the first prize. He was awarded the
prize by the Emir Ghazi, the son of the King of Iraq. Kadury was employed as an art
teacher at several schools in Baghdad.
In 1934 he came to Israel and began to earn his living in graphic art and
sign-making. With three of his sons he developed one of the biggest and leading
enterprises in the sign-making branch. Since his retirement, he has devoted all his
energy and time to art.
c. The artist Nissim Zalait in a series of three paintings describes a traumatic childhood
memory that affected him greatly. This was the anxiety and dread that he and members
of the Baghdad Jewish community suffered during the Shavuot massacre (the Farhud)
in 1941. An incited Arab mob descended on the Jews of Baghdad, slaughtering, raping,
and pillaging. The atrocity left the community in fear for its future safety. The revival
of Jewish nationalism that succeeded the pogrom brought about the conclusion of this
glorious and ancient Diaspora. In the operation known as Ezra and Nehemia, most of
the Iraqi Jewish community migrated to Israel.
In this series Zalait shows, using mixed media of oil and epoxy on canvas, the
events of the Farhud: "Month of Fear", "The Inevitable" (picture 5), "The Outcome".
Nissim Zalait was born in Baghdad in 1923 and immigrated to Israel in 1951.
He began his artistic training at the Academy of Fine Arts in Baghdad, and in Israel
continued at the Art Teachers' College of the Avni Institute in Tel Aviv. Outstanding
among his awards is the Jerusalem Prize, which he won in 1968.