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| City Guide - Jerusalem - Culture | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Culture Israel has a reputation for being a brash, if not coarse, society, but to see Israelis express themselves in music is to realise the underlying emotion and sensitivity of the nation. The Jerusalem Centre for the Performing Arts (tel: (02) 560 5757), 20 Marcus Street, in the German Colony area of West Jerusalem, which serves as the city's unofficial cultural centre. This venue and the Jerusalem Film Centre, Hebron Road (tel: (02) 672 4131), the city's trendy centre for arthouse films, are worth visiting in their own right, as places to absorb the buzz of creativity amongst Israel's most talented performers. The best ticket agency for nearly all concert and theatre performances in Jerusalem is the Bimot, 8 Shamai Street (tel: (02) 624 0896; fax: (02) 624 4535). Travellers to the city hoping to catch live shows can buy tickets very easily in person from box offices. Music: The Henry Crown Symphony Hall, 5 Chopin Street, is the home of the excellent Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (tel: (02) 561 1498/9; web site: www.jso.co.il). Tickets are usually priced NIS100-150. The world-renowned Israel Philharmonic Orchestra rotates performances between its main base in Tel Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem. Visitors to Jerusalem may find obtaining tickets for its concerts in the city very difficult. Such is the level of devotion to the orchestra that the ensemble boasts almost 30,000 season ticket holders, the largest subscription public per capita in the world. When it performs in Jerusalem, concerts are at the Binyanei Ha'oomah, near the Central Bus Station, at 1 Shazar Street (tel: (02) 655 8558). Dance: Lovers of dance will have no problem finding what they want in Jerusalem. The renowned Israel Ballet, Israel's only professional classical ballet company performs mainly in its home town of Tel Aviv with occasional productions in Jerusalem. Jerusalem's modern dance scene is best represented by the Jerusalem Tamar Dance Company and the Vertigo Dance Company. Traditional Jewish folk dancing is often performed at the International Cultural Centre for Youth (tel: (02) 566 4144), 12a Emek Refa'im Street. Film: Most foreign films in Jerusalem are screened in their original version with Hebrew subtitles. Among the most popular mainstream cinemas are the Kfir (tel: (02) 624 2523), 97 Jaffa Street, the Lev (tel: (02) 624 7587), at 37 Hillel Street, and the GG Gil (tel: (02) 678 8448), at the Jerusalem Mall, Malha Street. However, the best place for cinema in Jerusalem is the Cinematheque at the Jerusalem Film Centre, Hebron Road (tel: (02) 672 4131; web site: www.jer.cine.org.il/). The Cinematheque has two auditoria showing classics, critically acclaimed new releases and foreign arthouse films. Cultural events: Jerusalem's most important cultural event each year is the Israel Festival, which usually lasts for about a month between May and June. The Festival is a showcase for live theatre, dance and music from around the world and caters for the widest tastes, including opera, jazz, medieval chant and contemporary rock. A quieter, but no less enjoyable, event is the Abu Gosh Music Festival, which takes place over three days in June at the Crusader Church in the small Arab village of Abu Gosh, west of Jerusalem. Film-lovers should not miss the Jerusalem Film Festival, which takes place for about ten days in July at the Cinematheque and which highlights the best in current Israeli and international cinema. Literary Notes It is no coincidence that modern Israel's greatest living writers were born in the 1930s and lived in Jerusalem at the start of the Arab-Israeli War that followed the foundation of Israel in 1948. One constant theme is the contradiction of Jerusalem as the holy, eternal city of God and Jerusalem as the city of human conflict, with frequently changing political borders. A B Yehoshua deals with this in his novel The Lover (1977) which describes the attempt by a husband to trace his wife's lover who has disappeared during the Yom Kippur War of 1973. The husband finds the man living within a community of Orthodox Jews in Jerusalem and attempts to persuade him to rejoin the modern secular reality of life in the city. In Amos Oz's novel My Michael (1968), the tension between violence and spiritual yearning in Jerusalem leads to strains within a Jewish couple's marriage as they become more aware of both the threat and the hope offered by the city's Arab population. |
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