Berliners Antonia Blau and Stephanie Kloss have been travelling the length and breadth of Israel researching architecture and ‘political space’ in kibbutzim for an innovative and unique project they hope to put together as an exhibition in Berlin in the summer.
“When we began to think about this project we approached Alex Elsohn - the Givat Haviva Institute’s representative in Berlin - and he gave us some advice with regard whom to approach as we are looking for partners,” explained Stephanie.
Hence the arrival of the two ladies on campus at Givat Haviva in Wadi Ara where they spent some time with Dudu Amitai, director of Yad Yaari Research and Documentation Center and Yuval Danieli, Director of Art, Artists and Exhibitions of the kibbutz movement.
The researchers went through postcards depicting various architectural gems from the kibbutzim over the decades as well as books on kibbutz architecture such as that published a few years ago honoring the work of prominent architect Shmuel Mestechkin.
Realizing that the specialized kibbutz architecture of yore was fast disappearing, a group of kibbutz historians banded together to produce the book. Yuval Danieli was one of them.
“Mestechkin was an outstanding architect who although never a kibbutz member was very much a kibbutznik in attitude, a totally committed socialist,” Danieli explained to Antonia and Stephanie.
“The need to register and photograph the original buildings and record the basic function for which they were constructed was the main aim of the project.”
One of the buildings on campus, the old library which is of the Bauhaus style, was designed by Mestechkin.
Givat Haviva library designed by Shmuel Mestechkin (center)
Following their visit to Givat Haviva, Stephanie and Antonia spent a day at Kibbutz Hulda interviewing older members and taking photographs of the veteran kibbutz with a rich history and number of famous former members such as internationally known writer Amos Oz.
They also visited Kibbutz Mishmar HaEmek where they heard from Givat Haviva International Department staffer and member of that kibbutz Lydia Aisenberg about the kibbutz, one of the flagship Hashomer Hatzair kibbutzim founded in the 1920s.
Pressed for time with many a kibbutz on the to-be-visited list, the ladies visited Pinat HaGolah, the Holocaust Memorial of the kibbutz – and the nowadays dilapidated central building of Shomria, a very rich in historical content construction awaiting renovation having been deemed an historical site by the Israel Society for Preservation of Historical Sites.
In an evening an few early hours of the morning, a mission impossible to share with the ladies from Berlin so much about a kibbutz that is still very much a kibbutz and with many a tale to tell before and after the founding of the State of Israel. Promising to return for more, Stephanie and Antonia headed north on the trail of more interesting kibbutzim to check out.
The Berliners are being supported by the Goethe Institute and were told since arriving in Israel that that Institute intends to bring to Jerusalem the exhibition they will be busily preparing when they get home at the end of the month.
Any help Givat Haviva can give, they know will be warmly extended.
Text & Photos: Lydia Aisenberg
March, 2011
