Habesha Exhibition
Art Gallery at The Adam Clayton Jr. State Building
(Harlem State Building)
163 West 125th St. 2nd Flr.
Harlem, New York

Opening Sunday May 3rd, 2009 6-9pm

The exhibition will be available for viewing
from May 3rd to May 24th, 2009.

Special Viewing Hours hosted by BINA Cultural Foundation
Saturday May 9th, 2009 7-9pm

The Habesha exhibition will include a presentation of photography and paintings by Ethiopian and American Artists. In their own manner and medium, each artist tells a story of life, survival, and celebration. Each has interpreted the Ethiopian lifestyle in a unique way;

The Exhibition is a wide spectrum of artistic styles and subjects. Photographs by well-known photographer of Jewish life Joan Roth, who spent months in Ethiopia documenting rural Jewish life, were taken in Ethiopia predating the last waves of migrations of Ethiopian Jews to Israel. The work of photographer Yeganyahu Avishai Mekonen spans the Ethiopian Jewish experience in Israel. The work of Ezra Wube animations demonstrate his painterly touch as they unveil the struggle to realize a specific sense of identity relative to time and space.. Rose- Lynn Fisher has documented Ethiopian Jews in Israel and describes an experience that has stayed with her over time. While traveling with a group through Israel in 1991, I visited newly immigrated Ethiopian Jews who were temporarily housed at the Diplomat Hotel, an absorption center in Jerusalem. There, a young man approached and told me through a mix of gestures and telepathy that his wife just had a baby and perhaps I'd like to come up and meet them? Yes, I said. Entering the room I was kissed eight times by each person inside - and they were a big family! Instant love. When words are hopeless laughing is good. A brief encounter, lasting on as one of life's golden moments. The term Habesha (Abesha), has become synonymous with Ethiopian over the centuries. Its origin somewhat clouded in mystery it originally was used in reference to the Semitic-speaking group of people whose cultural, linguistic, and in certain cases, ancestral origins trace back to the tribes of Axum (Habesha). Habesha now references to all the variety of peoples that today makeup the population of Ethiopia. Through the Habesha Exhibition, we intend to show the full variety of the peoples that constitute Ethiopia, from the Tigrai, Amhara, Oromo and Hamar. The focus of the Habesha Exhibition will be extended beyond this year and reprised on an annual basis to present the diverse ethnic groups that are identified as Ethiopians today.

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