This page, clockwise from bottom left:

Yorron Hackmon assists Rhona Gorosh
and her daughter Kasie.

Students choose pattern designs.
Paul Markovitz, art teacher Joanne
Viviano, Aaron Markovitz and Eric Miller
get started on their projects.

Justin Corlin, and his mom Ailene work
closely on decorating their tallit.

Glenn Evans takes time with border trim.

Lisa Matlen, deep in concentration.

Opposite page, top to bottom:
Mike Burda puts finishing touches on a
dove-and olive-branch pattern.

Yorron Hackmon instructs student artists.

•

child is going to become a bar or bat
mitzvah" series. Temple Director of
Education Fran Pearlman met
Hackmon at the Conference on
Alternatives in Jewish Education, and
invited him to conduCt the workshop.
Pearlman said the bar/bat mitzvah
age is an anxious time, with so many
unknowns for the children. The pro-
ject makes the experience "tangible
and meaningful," she said.
Hackmon, a Judaic artist from
Rochester, N.Y., began developing
patterns for talleisim and matzah,
challah and siddur covers four years
ago. They include menorahs, letters,

shapes, Jewish stars and Torahs, re-cre-
ated from Jewish historical works, and
copied from Italian Torah covers, old
Jewish symbols found in cemeteries,
and by commissioned American
Jewish artists.
Each tallit is stitched with pockets
to accommodate the wool, Israeli-
made tzizit (fringes). Hackman's
instructions include the tying of one
of the four tzizit.
The other three he asks students to
create with their grandparents, so that
the tallit is not only something that
they know can one day be passed
down to their children, but that it is

already a legacy that has, in part, been
passed down to them.
"It doesn't matter which of Yorron's
patterns the students use," Pearlman
said, "because whatever they do, each
tallit will be an original."
While student Brett Manchel used
fabric markers to trace the letters of
the blessing for wearing the tallit,
Mike Burda filled in a dove-and-olive
pattern with red and green fabric
markers and Temple Israel's Rabbi
Loss answered the all-important ques-
tion, "Rabbi, which side is the top?
Jenna Oates adrriitteit."Me andy
mom are not crafty people, but this

.

was easy and fun." Her mom, Deb
Wexler, agreed. "There's no wrong in
the pattern — you just go with it."
Others, like Brooke Vallone think
they are making their own tallit, but
her mother Hilary told her that if she
gets one for her bat mitzvah, "I'm
keeping this one."
The project will be continued
throughout the school year. Teachers
will make certain a shawl will be
completed by the time each child is
ready to stand on the bimah, recite
the blessing, and place their tallit,
with its own personal meaning, _on
their shoulders. ❑

11/20
1998

Detroit Jewish News

15

