Still Wrapped in Happiness

There’s something about the tallis that has always pulled at me. That image of a Jew wrapped in a flimsy covering that shuts out the noise of This World and connects him to his Creator and inner core seems, to me at least, to be one of the most evocative and powerful symbols of Judaism.

As a landscape photographer, I do a lot of traveling, and I’ve captured exotic and colorful scenes from across the globe. During those travels, the tallis image kept playing at the edge of my consciousness. Then finally, I had an idea: to create a series of photos of a tallis-wrapped Jew in a variety of locations, and eventually to display them as a collection.

My photo of the tallis in Dubai made waves across the Arab-language media. I also managed an interesting photo of a tallis in Iceland. And as a resident of Israel, I was able to capture a tallis against the holy background of Eretz Yisrael as well.

But I’ve gotten the most emotional feedback to my photo of the tallis in Auschwitz.