NOVEMBER 18 • 2021 | 51
JAY SAPER continued from page 49
eventually, Saper says, the
town’s library was built on the
spot of his great uncle’s plant,
with no mention of the Jewish
business that had stood there.
Saper aims to keep this legacy
alive through his art.
NEW YORK YEARS
After college, Saper studied
progressive childhood edu-
cation at Bank Street College
in Manhattan. This was fol-
lowed by teaching children at
different progressive schools
in Manhattan and Brooklyn,
as well as being involved in
organizing and political proj-
ects. He joined Park Slope
Kolot Chayeinu, a progressive
Jewish community.
“In addition to my work as
a letterpress printer, I am also
a papercut artist,
” he says. “I
created papercuts, a tradition-
al Jewish folk art, to honor the
remarkable, overlooked sto-
ries of Jewish women in the
resistance to the Nazis. My
work was published as the
chapter ‘Fighting Fascists
with Folk Art’ in Cindy
Milstein’s There’s Nothing So
Whole as a Broken Heart:
Mending the World as Jewish
Anarchists (AK Press 2021).
”
Another papercut project
combined several of his inter-
ests. He wrote a zine called
Radical Village, a history of
the Little Red Schoolhouse
and Elizabeth Irwin High
School (LREI) founded in
1921 in Greenwich Village,
the families associated with it
and its connections to social
movements over the past cen-
tury. He became interested in
the school’s history before he
worked there and was drawn
to its Jewish beginnings.
“LREI was a hotbed of
Jewish radicalism,
” he says.
“The school’s first students
were Yiddish-speaking immi-
grants on the Lower East Side.
The school served as a haven
for politically active Jewish
teachers and families who
faced state repression and vio-
lence. The school was a cul-
tural center for experimental
and progressive Jewish artists.
”
As he dug into the history
of the school, he decided
to create a walking tour of
Greenwich Village that high-
lighted some of the school’s
famous students (Angela
Davis, the children of Julius
and Ethel Rosenberg and
more), supporters of the
school and events in the
school’s history. The zine,
with its papercuts, became a
companion piece to the tour.
Now that he’s back in East
Lansing, he is restoring his
traditional letterpress and
creating wood type, teaching
online, embracing Jewish cul-
tural art traditions and doing
his part to keep alive the spirit
of progressive social activism
so prevalent in generations of
Jews before him.
“I CREATED PAPERCUTS … TO
HONOR THE REMARKABLE,
OVERLOOKED STORIES OF
JEWISH WOMEN IN THE
RESISTANCE.”
— JAY SAPER
wife Persephone — set against
a poetically lyrical score of
American folk, New Orleans
jazz and blues. Mitchell
describes Hadestown as
“somewhere between a concert
and a theater show.
”
Odorisio, whose mother
is Jewish and whose father is
Italian, grew up in the large
Jewish area of Ardmore, Pa.,
where she and her two sis-
ters were all bat mitzvahed.
Growing up, they celebrated
all of the holidays, including
enjoying the Italian tradition
of the Feast of the Seven
Fishes on Christmas Eve
and eating Chinese food
and going to the movies on
Christmas Day.
Four years ago, Odorisio
got a ukulele for Chanukah.
With her mission to becoming
a proficient ukulele player,
Odorisio took in-person les-
sons in Brooklyn and then
continued on Zoom during
the pandemic. Now the owner
of three different ukuleles,
Odorisio travels with her con-
cert ukulele on tour and keeps
it in her dressing room.
“Once I finish my makeup, I
strum a little before the show.
It’s very relaxing and gets me
in the right frame of mind,
”
she says.
For her Hadestown audi-
tion, Odorisio played the
ukulele to showcase her musi-
cality since all the Fates play
instruments onstage during
the performance.
On some tour stops,
Odorisio’s boyfriend brings
her pit bull, Gusto, for a visit.
Odorisio promises
Detroiters: “You’ll want to
come see Hadestown because
you’ve never seen anything
like it before.
”
DETAILS
Hadestown runs Nov.
23-Dec. 5 at the Fisher
Theatre in Detroit and
from Dec. 7-12 at the
Wharton Center in East
Lansing. Tickets for
Hadestown at the Fisher
Theatre start at $59
and can be purchased
www.ticketmaster.com.
Tickets for Dec. 7-12 at
the Wharton Center may
be purchased by visiting
www.whartoncenter.com.
Theater patrons will be
required to show proof
of a negative COVID
test within 72 hours of
the performance date or
proof of full COVID-19
vaccination before they
will be admitted into the
venue. Additionally, all
patrons will be required to
wear a mask while inside
the theater, regardless of
one’s vaccination status.
Shea Renne, Bex Odorisio,
and Belén Moyano in
the Hadestown North
American Tour at
Detroit’s Fisher Theatre
Nov. 23-Dec. 5 and East
Lansing’s Wharton Center
Dec. 7-12.