'Architecture of an Existential Threat' – Adam Reynolds' documentation of the shelters in Israel, as an illustrated book at Edition Lammerhuber and an exhibition at the Jewish Museum Vienna
In Israel there are more than 1 million public and private bunkers. Israeli law stipulates that every citizen must have access to a shelter. For more than two years, American photographer Adam Reynolds photographed these ‘Doomsday spaces’ over a period of two years in all of their facets, opening a window into the collective mindset of this threatened country. With a text by Danielle Spera, Director of the Jewish Museum in Vienna. The photos are also on display in an exhibition on Judenplatz in Vienna.
Since its foundation in 1948, the state of Israel has felt isolated and under threat from enemies. This collective siege mentality manifests itself with over 1 million public and private shelters, found across the whole country. Israeli law stipulates that every citizen must have access to a shelter that can be sealed in case of an attack with unconventional weapons. The Israelis have integrated these ‘Armageddon rooms’ into their everyday life and ‘transformed’ them into spaces that look like normal dance studios, bars or temples. For many people in Israel who live with a personal history of exile and persecution, these shelters are the architecture of an existential threat – both real and perceived.
Adam Reynolds shot the images over the course of three years, from 2013 to 2015. The photographs offer a broad cultural and geographical typology of the shelter spaces by documenting them on either side of the Green Line, throughout Israel and the Occupied Territories, in an effort to offer the broadest survey possible. They straddle the distinct worlds of fine art and reportage. “Working in a country like Israel it is difficult, if not impossible, to separate art from social reality”, says Adam Reynolds.
ADAM REYNOLDS is a documentary photographer with his focus on the Middle East, he holds a master of fine arts degree in photography and bachelor degrees in journalism and political science from Indiana University, along with a master degree in Islamic and Middle East Studies from Hebrew University. His areas of focus include modern Middle East politics, Islamic studies and photo journalism. This academic background enables him to balance photographic creativity with a journalist’s thematic fidelity. In this way he has produced exceptional documents of the times, which have earned him many awards and are presented in exhibitions.
DR. DANIELLE SPERA has a degree in journalism and political science, 1978 to 2010 journalist, reporter, presenter and editorial adviser at ORF, 1987/88 ORF correspondent in Washington, since 2010 director of the Jewish Museum Vienna, since 2013 university counsellor at MUI, president of ICOM Austria, 1991 and 2007 Romy award winner, 1990 to 2002 lecturer in the Department of Communication, University of Vienna, author of numerous books and articles on contemporary art, Jewish topics and for the magazine NU.
Exhibition:
Arnold Reynolds “Shelter! Architecture of Survival”
Jewish Museum Vienna, Museum Judenplatz, 7 June – 8 October, 2017.
ARCHITECTURE OF AN EXISTENTIAL THREAT
Arnold Reynolds, Danielle Spera
22 x 27.5 cm, 144 pages, 72 photos
German, English, Hebrew
Hardcover, bound in linen,
french fold jacket
ISBN 978-3-903101-29-6, € 39.90
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