Mel Alexenberg מנחם אלכסנברג

melalexenberg@yahoo.com / www.melalexenberg.com / www.artiststory.com

 

ACADEMIC POSTIONS

2002-2014         EMUNAH COLLEGE, Jerusalem, Israel. Professor and Head of the School of the Arts

2000-2007         ARIEL UNIVERSITY, Ariel, Israel. Professor of Art and Jewish Thought

1990-2000         NEW WORLD SCHOOL OF THE ARTS, (Joint venture of University of Florida, Miami Dade College,  Miami Dade Public Schools) Miami, Florida. Dean of Visual Arts

1985-1990         PRATT INSTITUTE, Brooklyn, New York. Professor and Chairman of Fine Arts

1980, 1984-88   MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (MIT), Cambridge, Massachusetts. Research Fellow, Center for Advanced Visual Studies

1977-1984         BAR ILAN UNIVERSITY, Ramat Gan, Israel. Associate Professor of Education and Head of Ramat Hanegev College 

1973-1977.        COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York, New York. Associate Professor of Art and Education

1971-1973         UNIVERSITY OF HAIFA, Haifa, Israel. Senior Lecturer and Director of Experimental School

1969-1971         TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY, Ramat Aviv, Israel. Senior Lecturer, Graduate School of Education and at Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel

1965-1969.        ADELPHI UNIVERSITY, Long Island, New York. Assistant Professor of Education

 

PUBLIC SERVICE

2002-2017 WOLF FOUNDATION, Israel.  Member of the Council of the Foundation that awards the international Wolf Prizes in the sciences and the arts.  Appointed by the President of Israel on the recomendation of the Minister of Education.

 

GUEST LECTURER 

Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.  MIT, Cambridge,  Massachusetts College of Art, Boston.  Princeton University, New Jersey.  State University of New York at Stony Brook, New York.  University of Florida, Gainesville.  Florida International University, Miami.  University of Miami, Florida. University of South Florida, Tampa.  University of Arizona, Tucson.  College of Santa Fe, Santa Fe, New Mexico,  University of Southern California, Los Angeles. University of California at San Diego, La Jolla.  University of California at Santa BarbaraSan Jose State University, California. George Washington University, Washington, D.C.  Maryland Institute College of Art. Baltimore.  Queens College, City University of New York, Flushing.  Yeshiva University, New York City.  New York University, New York City. Lesley University, Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg. Jewish Theological Seminary of America, New York City.  Touro College, New York City.  Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati, Ohio.  University of Plymouth, Plymouth, England.  Altos de Chavon School of Design, Dominican Republic.  University of Pretoria, South Africa.  University of Witswaterstrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.  Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.  Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel.  Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel.  Haifa University, Haifa, Israel.  Holon Institute of Technology, Holon, Israel.  Oranim College, Kiryat Tivon, Israel.  Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem, Israel. Rubin Academy of Music and Dance, Jerusalem, Israel.  Schachter Institute of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, Israel. Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, Halifax, Canada, Hochschule fur Gestaltung/ZKM Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Germany.   

 

MUSEUM COLLECTIONS (artworks exploring digital technologies and global systems)

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York.  Museum of Modern Art, New York, New York.  Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York. Fine Arts Museum of Long Island, Hempstead, New York.  Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama.  Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, Maryland. National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.  Greenville Museum of Art, Greenville, North Carolina.  Hunter Museum of Art, Atlanta, Georgia. Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio.  Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, Ohio.  Meridian Museum of Art, Meridian, Mississippi. New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, Louisiana.   Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri.  Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, Missouri.  Midwest Museum of American Art, Elkhart, Indiana.  University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, Michigan.  Denver Art Museum, Denver, Colorado.  North Dakota Museum of Art, Grand Forks, North Dakota.  San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, Texas.  University of Wyoming Art Museum, Laramie, Wyoming.  Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, California.  Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon.  University of Kentucky Art Museum. Lexington, Kentucky.  Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Canada.  Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel.  Museum of Art, Haifa, Israel. Jewish  Museum, Prague, Czech Republic.  Musee des Beaux-Arts, Budapest, Hungary.  Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna, Austria.  Malmo Museum, Malmo, Sweden.  Museum het Rembrandthuis, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.  Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague, The Netherlands.  Victoria and Albert Museum, London, England.  Hunterian Art Gallery, University of Glasgow, Scotland.  Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery, Launceston, Australia.  Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, Caracas, Venezuela.  Museo Nacional de Artes Plasticas, Montevideo, Uruguay.

 

PUBLICATIONS (books, papers, exhibition catalogs by Mel Alexenberg)

Through a Bible Lens: Biblical Insights for Smartphone Photography and Social Media. HarperCollins Christian Publishing, 2018.

Photograph God: Creating a Spiritual Blog of Your Life.  North Charleston, SC: CreateSpace, 2015.

The Future of Art in a Postdigtial Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness. Bristol, UK: Intellect Books, and Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011.

Educating Artists for the Future: Learning at the Intersections of Art, Science, Technology, and Culture.  Bristol, UK: Intellect Books, and Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008.

Dialogic Art in a Digital World: Four Essays on Judaism and Contemporary Art.   Jerusalem: Rubin Mass House, 2008. (in Hebrew)

The Future of Art in a Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness. Bristol, UK: Intellect Books, and Chicago: University of Chicago Press 2006, paperback edition 2008. 

Miami in Ecological Perspective, Miami: New World School of the Arts, 1994.

LightsOROT: Spiritual Dimensions of the Electronic Age, Co-authored with Otto Piene, (exhibition catalog), Introduction by Rudolf Arnheim, Cambridge: Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and New York: Yeshiva University Museum, 1988.

Aesthetic Experience in Creative Process, Ramat Gan, Israel: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1981.

Light and Sight, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1970.

Sound Science, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1969.

A Unitary Model of Aesthetic Experience in Art and Science, (doctoral dissertation) New York University, 1969.

Art, Zionism, and Identity the Networked World, book in process in Hebrew and English editions. 

 

Autoethnographic Blogart Exploring Posdigital Relationships between Digital and Hebraic Writing, J. A. Alexander and J. Rhodes (eds.) The Routledge Handbook of Digital Writing and Rhetoric, New York and London: Routledge, 2018. 

On Being a Zionist Artist in a Networked World, Zipora: Journal of Education and Contemporary Art and Design. (in Hebrew) No. 3, 2014.

Postdigital Consciousness, Archithese: International Review of Architecture. No. 4, 2012.

Fringed Sukkah, in M. Bua and M. Golodfarb (eds.), Architectural Inventions: Visionary Drawings. London: Laurence King, 2012.

Eruv as Conceptual and Kinetic Art, Images: A Journal of Jewish Art and Visual Culture, 2011.  

Space-Time Structures of Digital Visual Culture: Paradigm Shift from Hellenistic to Hebraic Roots of Western Civilization, in Robert Sweeny (ed.), Inter/Sections/Inter/Actions: Art Education in a Digital Visual Culture, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association, 2010

Being with A/r/tography. Review of book by Springgay, Irwin, Leggo, and Gouzouasis. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, Spring 2009.

Concerning Down-to-Earth Spirituality in Art Education, NAEA News, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association, February 2009.

Autoethnographic Identification of Realms of Learning for Art Education in a Post-Digital Age, International Journal of Education through Art, Winter 2008.

Talmud Design and the Internet, What Was Old Is New Again, New York: Caeno Foundation and Karlsruhe: ZKM Center for Art & Media, 2008.

Letters, Torah, DNA, and Bits in Contemporary Art. in Yitzhak Recanati (ed.), Ot L’Olam: The Hebrew Letter, Jerusalem: Emuna College and Israel Ministry of Education, 2007. (in Hebrew)

Ancient Schema and Technoetic Art, Technoetic Arts: Journal of Speculative Research, Vol. 4, No. 1, 2006.

Biblical Fringes: Biomorphic Consciousness through Ancient Ritual, Proceedings of Consciousness Reframed Conference. Plymouth, UK: University of Plymouth, 2006. 

Cyberangels: Aesthetic Peace Plan for the Middle East, Leonardo: Journal of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology, Vol. 39, No. 3, 2006.

Technoetic Creativity: A Kabbalistic Perspective, Intellect Quarterly, Spring 2006

From Science to Art: Integral Structure and Ecological Perspective in a Digital Age, in Mary Stokrocki (ed.), Interdisciplinary Art Education: Building Bridges to Connect Disciplines and Cultures, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association, 2005.

Semiotic Redefinition of Art in a Digital Age, in Debbie Smith-Shank (ed.), Semiotics of Visual Culture: Sights, Signs, and Significance, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association, 2004.

Cyberangels: Aesthetic Peace Plan for the Middle East, Co-authored with Michaela Hajkova (exhibition catalog), Prague: Robert Guttmann Gallery of the Jewish Museum in Prague, 2004.

Creating Public Art through Intergenerational Collaboration, Art Education, Co-authored with Miriam Benjamin, Vol. 57, No. 5, September 2004.

An Interactive Dialogue: Talmud and the Net, Parabola, Vol. 29, No.2, Summer 2004.

Legacy Thrones: Intergenerational Collaboration in Creating Multicultural Public Art, Co-authored with Miriam Benjamin in Angela M. La Porte (ed.), Community Connections: Intergenerational Links in Art Education, Reston, VA: National Art Education Association, 2004.

Jewish Consciousness and Art of the Digital Age, Journal of Judaism and Civilization, Vol. 5, 2004.

Wright and Gehry: Biblical Consciousness in American Architecture, Journal of Cultural Research in Art Education, Vol. 21, 2003.

Don’t Divorce Art from Morality, The Jerusalem Post, December 23, 2003.

Creating Legacy Thrones, Co-authored with Miriam Benjamin. Generations United, September 2003.

Danish Lights: 1942, Lumia: International Light Art, (exhibition catalog) Copenhagen: Charlottenborg Art Gallery, 1999.

Expanding the Definition of Art, Judaism and Art, David Cassuto (ed.), Ramat Gan, Israel: Kotlar Institute for Judaism and Contemporary Thought, Bar-Ilan University, 1989 (in Hebrew).

Aesthetics in Judaism, Co-authored by Alter Ben-Zion Metzger and Yaacov Ort, Wellsprings, Vol. 5, No. 3, April-May 1989.

LightsOROT: Spiritual Dimensions of the Electronic Age, (exhibition catalog) C, Introduction by Rudolf Arnheim, Cambridge: Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New York: Yeshiva University Museum, 1988, 113 pages.

Light, Vision and Art in Judaism: A Dialogue, Co-authored with Norman Lamm, LightsOROT, (exhibition catalog) Cambridge: Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and New York: Yeshiva University Museum, 1988.

Art with Computers: The Human Spirit and the Electronic Revolution, Visual Computer: International Journal of Computer Graphics, Vol. 4, No. 1, 1988.

CRASH: Computing Assisted Hardcopy, Ted Pope and George Cramer (eds.) (exhibition catalog), Beloit and Madison: Beloit College Museums and University of Wisconsin, 1988.

Computer Angels, Co-authored with Rhonda Cooper (exhibition catalog), Stony Brook: The Fine Arts Center Art Gallery, State University of New York, 1987.

Computer Angels of Peace, Co-authored with Eleanor Flomenhaft (exhibition catalog), Hempstead: Fine Arts Museum of Long Island, 1987.

Imagining Antarctica, Rachel Weiss (ed.) (Ars Electronica exhibition catalog), Linz, Austria: State Museum of Linz, 1986.

Educating a Jewish Artist, Co-authored with Moshe Dror, Bisdeh Hemed, No. 5-6, May-June 1984. (In Hebrew)

A Semiotic Taxonomy of Contemporary Art Forms, Studies in Art Education, Vol. 17, No. 3, 1976.

Toward an Integral Structure through Science and Art, Main Currents in Modern Thought, Vol. 30, No. 4, 1974.

Educational Implications of a Model of Aesthetic-Creative Experience, Hitpatchut Hayeled: Israel Journal of Child Development, Vol. 1, 1971. (in Hebrew).

Teaching Children Science: An Inquiry Approach, Biosciences, Journal of the American Institute of Biological Sciences.  Vol. 19, No. 7, July 1969.

Biology Education: The First Task and Central Purpose. American Biology Teacher, Vol. 29, No. 3, March 1967.

The Binary System and Computers, Science and Children, Co-authored with Rosemary B. Blaney, Vol. 2, No. 3, November 1964.

Teaching the Scientific Method with the Pendulum, School Science and Mathematics, March 1962

Pigmy ‘Armadillos’: The Pill-bugs, Junior Natural History MagazineVol. 26, No. 10, February 1962.   

PUBLICATIONS (writings about Mel Alexenberg)

Emily Bilski, Golem: Danger, Deliverance and Art, (exhibition catalog), Foreword by Isaac Bashevis Singer, New York, The Jewish Museum, 1988.

Adam Brown, Review of The Future of Art in a Digital Age, Network, Art/Design/Media Subject Center, The Higher Education Academy, UK, issue 05, September 2008.

Sima Canaan, American Artist Settles in the Desert, Ha’aretz, December 16, 1982. (in Hebrew).

Joanne Cavanaugh, City May Corner a Place in Giant Artwork, The Miami Herald, March 10, 1996.

Luis Cancel, Mel Alexenberg: Digitized Homage to Rembrandt, The Second Emerging Expression Biennial: The Artist and the Computer, (exhibition catalog), New York: The Bronx Museum of the Arts, 1987.

Haim Chertok, Booths, Beerhalls, and BMW: Building a Sukkah in Munich, Moment, Vol. 9, No. 9, October, 1984.

Haim Chertok, Countering Doomsday: Israeli Artist Menahem Alexenberg Fights the Fateful Tashmad - Destruction - the Acronym for this Year, 5744, with Sky Art, Baltimore Jewish Times, 1984.

Haim Chertok, Just Messing About: Review of Aesthetic Experience in Creative Process, Jerusalem Post Magazine, August 21, 1981.

Haim Chertok,Traveling to Sodom, The Jewish Spectator, Summer 1988.

Jurgen Claus, Sky Art - Der Himmel wird bunter, Das Kunstwerk, Vol. 38, No. 1, February 1985. (in German).

Rhonda Cooper, Mel Alexenberg: Computer Angels, (exhibition catalog), Stony Brook: The Fine Arts Center Art Gallery, State University of New York, 1987.

Adriana Cordovi, Generations Join to Work on Princely Project: Throne Art Links Seniors and Students, The Miami Herald, November 27, 1997. 

Barbara Delatiner, Artist’s Angel to Fly by Computer, The New York Times, August 16, 1987.

Vince Dziekan, The Future of Art in a Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness (book review), New Media & Society, Vol.10, 2008.  

Marcia Facundo, Moldear los Suenos con los Anos, El Nuevo Herald, October 6, 1998. (in Spanish)

Eleanor Flomenhaft, Mel Alexenberg: Angels of Peace, (exhibition catalog), Hempstead:  Fine Arts Museum of Long Island, 1987.

Michaela Hajkova, Mel Alexenberg: Cyberangels: Aesthetic Peace Plan for the Middle East, (exhibition catalog), Prague: Robert Guttmann Gallery of the Jewish Museum in Prague, 2004.

Rob Harle, The Future of Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness (book review), Leonard Digital Reviews, December 2006.

Jerome Hausman, The Future of Art in a Digital Age (book review), Arts and Activities, Dec. 2007.

Elizabeth Hayt-Atkins, LightsOROT, ARTnews, Vol. 87, No. 7, September, 1988.

Rita Irwin, Educating Artists for the Future (book review), Studies in Art Education, Spring 2009.

Jeff Krasner, Mind Leaping: Creating What Can Be, Boston Herald, April 29, 1985.

Karen Lipsen, From Labyrinth to Computer, Newsday, August 28, 1987.

E. Lozano and Algis Mickunas, Gebser and Pedagogy: The Integral Difference, in Consciousness and Culture, ed. E. M. Kramer , Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood, 1992, 179-199.

Tsipi Luria, Thoughtful Craft, Computer Angel, Makor Rishon, February 3, 2006. (in Hebrew)

Aaron Meged, Torah Emerges From Yeroham, D’var, March 6, 1981. (in Hebrew) 

Cathy Peck, Computer Angels, The Print Collector’s Newsletter, Vol. 28, No. 2, May-June, 1987.

Otto Piene, Sky Art ‘83: BMW Museum, Munich, Cambridge: Center for Advanced Visual Studies, M.I.T., 1983.

Otto Piene, Sky Art ‘86, (exhibition catalog), Cambridge: Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1986.

Ted Pope and George Cramer: Mel Alexenberg: Ascent of Computer Angels from the Land of Israel, CRASH: Computing Assisted Hardcopy, (exhibition catalog), Beloit and Madison: Beloit College Museums and University of Wisconsin, 1988.

Rhizome at the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New Book: The Future of Art in a Digital Age, Rhizome.org, Aug, 17, 2006.

Shelly Rimon, The Arab-Israeli Conflict is an Aesthetic Problem, Yediot Achronot, May 4, 1990. (in Hebrew)

John Ross, Clare Romano and Tim Ross: Computer and the Print: Mel Alexenberg’s Corporate Angel, The Complete Printmaker, New York and London: The Free Press, Macmillian, 1990.

Rotem, Tamar, Big Brooklyn Angel, Ha’aretz, September 29, 2000. (in Hebrew)

Olivia Sagan, Educating Artists for the Future: Learning at the Intersections of Art, Science, Technology, and Culture (book review), ESCalate, Education Subject Centre, Advanced Learning and Teaching in Education, The Higher Education Academy, UK, http://escalate.ac.uk/4691, December 2008.

Haim Shapiro, In God’s Image: Dr. Menahem Alexenberg Talks about the Connection between Judaism and Art. The Jerusalem Post, September 29, 2000.

Ori Z. Soltes, Mel Alexenberg, Art of Jewish Food, (exhibition catalog), Washington, D.C.: National Jewish Museum, 1998.

Ori Z. Soltes, Mel Alexenberg, Fixing the World: Jewish American Painters in the Twentieth Century, Hanover and London: Brandeis University Press and University Press of New England, 2003.  Alexenberg painting from Digitized Homage to Rembrandt series reproduced on the book cover.

Ori Z. Soltes, Mel Alexenberg: Computer Graphics and Peace, Mosaic: The Jews of Florida, (exhibition catalog), Washington, D.C.: B’nai B’rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum, 1994.

Scott Thomsen, Fame is Just Around Portland’s Corner: The City Would Join Miami, San Diego and Seattle in What the Artist calls One Country, Four Viewpoints, Portland Press Herald, July 4, 1995.

Scott Thomsen, Portland Groups Intrigued by Four Corners Project, Portland Press Herald, October 31, 1995.

Menachem Wecker, The Jewish McLuhan: The Future of Art in a Digital Age (book review), Forward, Feb. 2, 2007.

Rachel Weiss, Imagining Antarctica, (exhibition catalog), Linz, Austria: State Museum of Linz, 1986.

BIOGRAPHY in:  Who’s Who in American Art , Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Education, Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers (The Best Teachers in America Selected by the Best Students), Who’s Who in Israel, and Who’s Who in the World

EDUCATION

Ed.D. (Interdisciplinary doctorate in art, science, education, and psychology), New York University, 1969. 

Doctoral Dissertation: A Unitary Model of Aesthetic Experience in Art and Science.

Studied painting at Art Students League of New York, 1961-1965.

M.S. (Education and psychology), Yeshiva University, 1959.

B.S. (Biology), Queens College, City University of New York, 1958.