Archie Rand's ‘The 613’ paintings at San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum

JEWISH WEEKLY
By Robert Nagler Miller

“Not to Test the Prophet,” from Archie Rand’s “The 613” series

SAN FRANSICO---Completed in 2008, [Archie Rand's] 613 20-by-16-inch canvas paintings have never been exhibited in a museum or gallery — until now. Beginning on Thursday, July 20, the works will be on display at San Francisco’s Contemporary Jewish Museum, where visitors will have a chance to express pleasure, confusion, annoyance, consternation, revulsion, excitement and myriad other emotions that the painter’s bold, colorful, lurid, humorous, anti-literal and completely irreverent images evoke. Talking recently about his career and the 613 project, Rand spoke of the need to develop a “visual language” within Judaism, where traditions, practices and culture have subsisted primarily on “a textual system” of written codes and interpretations. [More]

The Contemporary Jewish Museum: "The 613 by Archie Rand" (Jul 20, 2017–Oct 22, 2017); 736 Mission St, San Francisco, CA; (415) 655-7800; thecjm.org