Julie Weitz

MY golem

a recurring performance art project embodying a diasporic humanoid from Yiddish folklore

2017–2020

Since 2017, Weitz has focused on a recurring performance art project in which she embodies a mythological golem. The project is titled My Golem, and began in response to the “Unite the Right Rally” in Charlottesville, VA. In videos on Instagram, Weitz portrayed a stylized clay creature brought to life in response to mounting antisemitism and xenophobia. Over the course of the next four years, the project progressed from a stylized satire of current affairs into an imaginative reinterpretation of the diasporic narrative tradition. The artworks included here represent the diverse iterations of the My Golem project that Weitz produced from 2017-2020.

by embodying a Jewish supernatural creature able to feel, acknowledge, and tackle injustice, Weitz creates cross-temporal sites of solidarity…she reframes Jewish mythology in a contemporary context, affirming the urgency of Jewish ancestral ethics and setting a Jewish agenda for the present.

• Dr. Melissa Melpignano, AJS Perspectives

MY GOLEM: AN INTRODUCTION

2-channel video billboard, Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, 4:00m loop, 2018

In 2018, Innovation Foundation and WEHO Arts commissioned Weitz to produce the short film, My Golem: An Introduction, which screened on video billboards along the Sunset Strip for a two-month period. Nestled between businesses and looming over pedestrians, the billboards were intended to push the viewer out of the mundanity of their daily routine and introduce broader audiences to the mythology of My Golem. Curated by Jessica Rich.

Tashlich

Performance, New York City, NY, 2019

Weitz was commissioned by The New Shul in New York City to lead a Jewish New Year’s ritual performing as My Golem in collaboration with Rabbi Zach Fredman and violinist Zafer Tawil. The performance was restaged a few weeks later for small gathering at Debs Pond in Los Angeles. Tashlich marked My Golem’s first enactment as a spiritual guide for a religious congregation.

MY GOLEM PROTESTS

multiple performances as political protest, 2019-2021

In 2019, Weitz was invited by activists collaborating with multiple immigrant rights organizations to perform My Golem at related protests across Southern California, including at the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in Adelanto and the Los Angeles headquarters of the private prison company GeoGroup which runs that ICE facility. These protest-performances used political theater to draw attention to the by-now notorious abuses of the Trump-era agency.

I DON'T KNOW, ADONAI

1-channel HD video, 1:47m, 2019

On the one year anniversary of poet/singer-songwriter David Berman’s death, Weitz released the video/essay, I Don’t Know, Adonai, to commemorate her friendship and collaboration with David Berman. The video features My Golem’s movement-based performance with original vocals by Berman which he recorded for Weitz in 2011, and music by Pam Shaffer. The music website Talkhouse published Weitz’s essay to Berman on August 7, 2020. 

Shapeless Mass

1-channel HD video, 3:56m, 2019.

A stoner tutorial by the artist explaining the Kabbalistic rituals and nascent philosophy of making a golem. Music by Pam Shaffer.

MY GOLEM, HER TOWER

1-channel HD video, 2:30m, 2020.

A short film that combines the mythology of the golem with that of the tower of Babel. The film premiered in Issue #7 SIX + GENDERS of PROTOCOLS. Curated by Aimee Rubensteen with music by Pam Shaffer.

Rituals of a Globalist

1-channel HD video, 10:12m (loop), 2019.

A futuristic queer golem ventures into the desert to perform a series of quixotic rituals. Rooted in Jewish practices of mourning and prayer, her activities reflect a world in need of healing and restoration. Weitz premiered the short film in a two-person show at Aspect Ratio Gallery in Chicago in April 2019. Music by Jonathan Freilich.