Eli Berman, Litanies of Lilith, electro puppet opera, 2026.
Saturday, November 14, 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM.
Shifting Grounds: New Jewish Art Festival is a two-day multidisciplinary arts festival exploring the range of art created by Jewish artists working in and around Brooklyn today. Presented by The Neighborhood: An Urban Center for Jewish Life on November 14 and 15, the weekend features a group exhibition, two evening performance programs and a Sunday morning workshop for families.
The first evening of Shifting Grounds brings together music, theater, poetry, dance, and puppetry to explore Jewish mythology, history, and contemporary life. Moving between the intimate and the collective, the performances engage with themes of transformation, power, love, and belonging through experimental approaches to storytelling, sound, and movement.
Saturday, November 14’s performance features:
Eli Berman’s Litanies of Lilith: an electro puppet opera work-in-progress depicting Lilith’s transformation from the first wife of Adam into the primordial mother of demons. Written, composed, and performed by Eli Berman, Litanies of Lilith features Yiddish translations by Moishe Dolman, and sounds generated through voice and wearable electronics as well as beats and drones made from vocal samples.
Catherine (C. Francis) Fisher’s Fresh Hell: a performance which brings together dance by Florence Nasar and music by Ira Gamerman featuring excerpts from Fisher’s forthcoming book-length poem.
Ira Gamerman’s Humorous Musings: a collection of short pieces on fame, surveillance, love, and isolation.
Ben Gassman’s The Board Minutes of Union Temple (1939-1947): a theatrical collaboration with Rachel Gita Karp and Lindsey Hope Pearlman depicting Louis Hamburger’s growing intolerance of fellow board member Charles Cohen.
SUPPORT
Shifting Grounds: New Jewish Art Festival is presented by The Neighborhood: An Urban Center for Jewish Life. The Neighborhood gathers people together for inventive and unexpected Jewish arts, culture, and spirituality, bringing together Brooklyn energy with Jewish experience to spark meaning and joy. A project of Asylum Arts at The Neighborhood, Artist Working Groups bring together Jewish artists from across Brooklyn for professional development, collaboration, and creative feedback through a multidisciplinary retreat and discipline-specific cohorts.
This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.