It’s been 51 years since American pop artist George Segal’s sculpture “Sacrifice of Isaac” was first installed outside Tel Aviv’s Mann Auditorium. The modernist artist, raised in New York by his Eastern European immigrant parents, chose the story of the sacrifice of Isaac as an homage to his father and his own affinity with the biblical story. The sculpture was first exhibited in May 1973 at the outdoor plaza of Tel Aviv’s Mann auditorium. Five months following the sculpture’s installation, the Yom Kippur War broke out, and the events of those weeks of war charged the sculpture with a new range of political and social meanings. For the casting of the characters, Segal invited Israeli sculptor Menashe Kadishman and his son to model Abraham and Isaac. The collaboration between the American artist and a prominent Israeli artist regarding a politically charged subject resulted in a significant work on an international scale. Years later, Kadishman ended up creating his own take on the “Sacrifice of Isaac” story, with a connection to his own son’s beginning his service in the Israeli army (his sculpture is on permanent display outisde the Tel Aviv Art Musuem in “Hostgages Square”. In our session with Sophia, we will examine art works by Segal, focusing on this remarkable sculpture, and explore it’s relevance today.

Since 2016, Sophia Berry has been working as an Assistant Curator at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art (TAMA). Her position at TAMA includes responsibilities of managing exhibitions from the Museum’s collections and external loans, researching the Museum’s collections, overseeing outgoing loans, writing catalogue texts, and leading restoration projects. Sophia’s latest project was a special exhibition of George Segal’s (1914–2000) sculpture, Sacrifice of Isaac, that was uncovered after a two year restoration process. Sophia has also curated a special display dedicated to Joseph Israel’s From Darkness and Light (1871), which was recently discovered to have been Jewish property before the War. Since her return from a two year sabbatical in Denver Col. Sophia has been working in the photography department.