Cotsen Studio Residency
September 1, 2021-October 22, 2022
The Cotsen Studio is a year-long program that invites artists and designers to visit the museum to research the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection. The George Washington University community and the public have opportunities to interact with these artists through lectures, studio visits and hands-on workshops.
About the 2021-22 Artist-in-Residence
New York-based artist Ghiora Aharoni mines cultural artifacts and sacred texts — recontextualizing words, symbols and objects to examine both their original significance and reconsider their narratives in contemporary culture. His work has been exhibited internationally and is in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, among others.
About the Display
Aharoni presents an alternative perspective to a peripheral Jewish edict that states that women’s voices are too seductive, and thus should not be heard. In this installation, an embellished Yemenite Jewish wedding headdress symbolically celebrates and venerates women’s voices. The new work is displayed alongside historical hats from the Cotsen Textile Traces Study Collection that Aharoni selected for further research and inspiration.