Biblical Calligraphy: The Psalms

Debra Band is coming to VTS this Wednesday for a presentation at the Forum Hour on her new book on the Psalms and on the project of biblical calligraphy in general. This will be of special interest to all Hebrew students and former Hebrew students, all OT/HB folks, and art-interested people in general. Be There (The Small Dining Room)!

Debra Band’s work in Hebrew illuminated manuscripts draws upon her love of both the manuscript arts and of Jewish tradition and learning. She holds a BA Honours in History from Concordia University in Montreal and an MS in Political Science from MIT, and turned full attention to Hebrew manuscript arts in 1987. She studied Hebrew calligraphy with Gwenyth Welch in Berkeley, and is otherwise self-taught in the manuscript arts. Descended from an eminent rabbinic family, married into a family of scholars of modern Hebrew literature, her extensive studies of Jewish texts and research into medieval European and middle Eastern painting and manuscripts inform her work. Her illuminated manuscript, The Song of Songs: the Honeybee in the Garden was published by the Jewish Publication Society in 2005, and the original artwork has toured museums and galleries across the United States, The recently completed I Will Wake the Dawn: Illuminated Psalms, was published by the Jewish Publication Society in September 2007; the 82 original paintings will be displayed at the Dadian Gallery at the Wesley Theological Seminary in DC from late January through early March 2008. Presently engaged in illuminations of the pilgrimage poems of Judah Halevi (collaborating with Raymond S. Scheindlin of the Jewish Theological Seminary), she plans several other projects illuminating biblical text and other Jewish poetry. Extensive information about her work is available at http://www.dbandart.com/. Debra has lived throughout the United States and Canada, and after many years in California and New Mexico, presently resides in the Washington, DC area along with her husband and sons.