If These Walls Could Talk

How can you get one side in a conflict to hear and acknowledge the legitimacy of the other? It’s one of the most intractable questions in politics, and it’s also the paradox at the heart of Dialogue on the Wall—an installation by architect and artist Jay Isenberg and his wife and collaborator, Lynda Monick–Isenberg.

The idea of a wall as something other than a barrier springs from what Isenberg calls the “collision of two iconic architectures,” namely the separation wall between Israel and Palestine and the Western Wall in Jerusalem. “As an architect, the separation wall is a powerful and physical metaphor for so many issues of this conflict,” says Isenberg. “It serves as a visceral reminder of the power of ‘architecture’ to affect people’s lives.”

Isenberg isn’t just talking about a wall as metaphor either. A ten-foot–high wall will literally split the Form + Content gallery space in two. One side will function as a reflective space, the other as an interactive space with objects, audio narratives, and projections ranging from “provocative difficult images to the human stories of common people and their hopes, dreams, and desires,” says Isenberg. “The screaming of the ideologues, the voices and faces of children, the brave, the cowardly, the righteous.”

Isenberg is an American Jew who supports Israel and justice for the Palestinians, but his ultimate aim isn’t to persuade people one way or the other. His goal for the exhibit: “I want each to hear the voice of the other. That is all I can ask.” Opens Aug. 16. 210 N. 2nd St., Mpls., 612-436-1151

Contact Stephanie Xenos at stephaniexenos@yahoo.com.