Tune into Episode 22 of The Bridging Connections Podcast showcasing the evolving Jewish community featuring Jewish Studio Project and their method of integrating art with Torah study.

Featuring: Rabbi Adina Allen, Co-founder & Creative Director

“The world isn’t lacking more information. What we need is a way to process and hold and to integrate that information so it can actually have an effect on us and can shift our actions,” are the thoughts that led Rabbi Adina to realize that both with art making and Judaism are ways that could help us stay with what is hard so that it can move through us and something new and and transformative can come out.

Jewish Studio Project (JSP) exists to expand the capacities of individuals and communities to be with challenge and change. Through a unique methodology (the Jewish Studio Process) that combines creative practices from the field of art therapy with Jewish learning techniques and spiritual community building, JSP helps people to cultivate curiosity, navigate uncertainty, sit with discomfort, and process complexity so that right action can emerge. JSP is founded on the belief that creativity exists within each of us and that creativity is a vital resource in the work of social transformation. The creative process is JSP’s central tool for expanding empathy and resilience, supporting the work of dismantling oppression, and drawing forth the new narratives, insights and images that can help bring a more just world into being.

JSP innovates a new approach to Jewish creativity—one in which art is not just for artists and Jewish texts are not just for scholars. Rabbi Adina Allen, Co-Founder and Creative Director, developed JSP’s methodology as a rabbinical student after identifying a need for new ways of seeking and processing personal insights from Jewish texts. The Jewish Studio Process provides individuals and teams a way to activate their imagination and bring emotions and intuition into their engagement with Jewish life.

Through community programs, immersive experiences, trainings and professional development engagements, JSP has brought its work to nearly ten thousand participants and collaborated with over 100 organizations seeking creative approaches to Jewish engagement.

Visit Jewish Studio Project’s website here. Check out their upcoming programs here.

Follow Jewish Studio Project on Facebook , Instagram , and Twitter.

Definitions and Clarifications

Beresheit barah Elohim- In the beginning God created. The first three Hebrew words of the Torah

Beit Kanessest- (lit. meeting house) A building or place of meeting for worship and religious instruction in the Jewish faith, synagogue

Birkat Hamazon-(lit. The Blessing of Food), known in English as the Grace After Meals, is a set of Hebrew blessings that Jewish Halakha (Laws) prescribes following a meal that includes at least a kezayit (olive sized) piece of bread.

D’var Torah-(lit. a word of Torah) a brief teaching from Jewish sources, a sermon

Hamotzi- Hebrew prayer over bread before meals

J.O.C. - Jews of Color

P’suk- sentence, line of Bible

T’felah- prayer (either services, or an individual prayer)

Torah- the law of God as revealed to Moses and recorded in the first five books of the Hebrew scriptures (the Pentateuch)