Source: Tablet Magazine
Last August, a group of young Jewish artists gathered at San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum to write, record, and animate the short films illustrating famous Talmud tales. Over the course of one intensive week, the participating animators and storytellers, many of whom were encountering the Talmud for the first time, brought to life six of the Babylonian Talmud’s best-known tales. Organized by G-dcast, the Jewish nonprofit production company best known for its animations of the Bible, this new initiative, called Studio G-dcast, is out to change the way American Jews approach the Talmud.
Sarah Lefton and Studio G-dcast educators chose the six stories that would be the focus of the first, pilot studio. In addition to being among the Talmud’s best-known narratives, all address the theme of “tradition versus innovation,” one of the central concerns of rabbinic literature.
Twelve animators and storytellers, a religiously and artistically diverse group selected from some 60 applicants, arrived for a grueling week in San Francisco. After receiving a crash course lecture in Talmud the first day, the participants were divided into six pairs—a nod to the traditional hevruta method of partner learning—and assigned their texts. The remaining long days and nights were devoted to producing the films.
Studio G-dcast CJM 2013 is scheduled for August 11th-16th 2013.
Read the whole story at Tablet Magazine.
See last Studio G-dcast CJM 2012's videos here.