48 | SEPTEMBER 28 • 2023 
J
N

I

t has been almost 20 years since 
multi-media artist Michelle Sider learned 
about the plight of Jewish people com-
pelled to leave Yemen, and it has been some 
four years since she began communicating 
about them by designing mosaic images.
With 10 images completed in the “I Am 
Yemenite” series and more images being 
planned, Sider has secured display space at 
ArtPrize, a Grand Rapids exhibition and 
competition held in summer and autumn 
since 2009. Represented are international 
artists, and this year the display lasts until 
Oct. 1. 
Sider’s images, based on a compilation 

from photos and considerable research, are 
being shown at Uccello’s Ristorante, 122 
Monroe Street NW
.
“I believe the history of Mizrahi Jews 
(those basically from Middle East and North 
African nations) is an incredible part of his-
tory that has been overlooked,
” said Sider, a 
Huntington Woods resident who traces her 
own background to the Ashkenazi popula-
tion. 
“The driving force behind this whole 
series is to educate, and I would love for this 
series to be a spark for Jewish educators to 
widen their scope to include a more global 
and inclusive focus.
”
In preparing her images out of glass, met-
als and pottery found during a trip to Israel, 
Sider has read books and magazine articles 
and interviewed people who can trace the 
Yemenite culture in their own heritage. 
People interviewed have included those 
married into her family and a professor at 
the University of Michigan.
Sider has told about learning of different 
prayer rituals, holiday customs and special-
ized foods that have been associated with 
the Yemenite ways of life.
According to what Sider has been advised, 
large numbers of Yemenites went to Israel 
soon after Israel became a nation. It was 
important, she said, to their looking for 
conditions favorable to the family traditions 
they knew and practiced. For example, 
Torah observances start very early among 
people following Yemenite expectations.

ARTS&LIFE
ART

ELI SIDER

Local artist has display at 
Grand Rapids ArtPrize.

‘I Am 
 Yemenite’

SUZANNE CHESSLER 
CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Details

To learn more 
about ArtPrize, 
which ends 
Oct. 1, go to 
artprize.org.

Michelle 
Sider
“Yemenite Coffee”

“Literacy”
“Alaskan Airlines”

