guide to the jewplexed

Giant Rock Swallowed by Budget Hole.

Will Los Angeles' new gigantic outdoor artwork, "Levitated Mass," fail to uplift?jewplexed

Long after "Letterman," on a recent Shabbat, I witnessed the final leg of the journey of a 340 ton rock slated to be the key component of a Los Angeles County Museum of Art installation by artist Michael Heizer called, "Levitated Mass." The almost two story high rock, quarried in nearby Riverside County was moved on its over 100 mile trip on a specially designed transporter that was so wide special permits were required, and any low hanging traffic signals and wires in its path needed to be moved to make way.

Since the final night of the eleven day journey brought the rock moving caravan to within two blocks of my home, at around 1:30 AM, my wife and I went over to watch the parade. Moving slowly enough that I could keep pace with it, the nearly block long transporter rolled by. Spotlights attached to the carrier illuminated a huge stone slung from steel cables, and completely enrobed in white fabric.

Earlier that evening, preceding dinner, we had welcomed the Sabbath bride, Shabbat Hamalka, who is imagined as dressed in white. Was the rock her bulky emissary? Like Hamalka, it was bringing light to the city, but a light that left questions in its shadow.
 
On its route, as the rock passed through neighborhoods of every income level and ethnic background, the question was asked to reporters by bystanders: "Who is paying for this?" According to reports in the media, the ten million dollar cost of the rock and move, as well as the installation, was paid for through private donations.

Ten million to move a rock? Without doubt, watching it roll by was an exciting spectacle, and I am sure many, including me, will visit the installation when it is completed in early summer. (The rock will be situated on rails at the end of a downward sloped concrete slot, allowing visitors to walk beneath it.) But I could not help but wonder what else the money might have been used for. As the rock rolled by, I imagined an inner city baseball field, a tree-lined park, even better street lighting.

There's a midrash, an interpretive story from the Talmud, that came to mind about Rabbi Joshua ben Levi, a sage who lived in Israel during the first half of the third century:

The rabbi went on a trip to Rome, and on a tour of the city, encountered the fine stone statues dedicated to the Roman gods and emperors. To protect the statues from the cold, he saw that they were wrapped with drapes and tapestries. In contrast to that care, he also saw abject poverty; a poor man dressed in rags standing at the statue's feet.

Was the giant rock our wrapped statue?

Three days after the rock reached its destination, I read in the L.A. Times that the city school board, due to budget shortfalls, was poised to drop its entire adult education program-- a system which is heavily used by those who want to learn English, or improve their job skills.

"Levitated Mass" may inspire, but what about the inspiration of finding a job? Where is the donor who wants to lift that stone? That ten million would make quite a lever.

As a work of art, does "Levitated Mass" represent the weight that no one wants to support?



Edmon J. Rodman has written about making his own matzah for JTA, Jewish love music for the Jerusalem Post, yiddisheh legerdemain for the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, a Bernie Madoff Halloween mask for the Forward, and what really gets stuck in the La Brea Tar Pits for the Los Angeles Times. He has edited several Jewish population studies, and is one of the founders of the Movable Minyan, an over twenty-year-old chavura-size, independent congregation. He once designed a pop-up seder plate. In 2011 Rodman received a First Place Simon Rockower Award for "Excellence in Feature Writing" from the American Jewish Press Association."