Amid COVID-19, Israeli culture looks to the future with cautious optimism

• Published date: 29 December 2020
• Date: 29 December 2020
• Author: HANNAH BROWN

His cautious optimism, as he edits his 21st feature film, Portrait of Victory, which he managed to make during the pandemic, is echoed by many in the world of Israeli culture, which may have been hit harder by the pandemic than any other sector.

Except for a few brief periods of respite when museums and theaters were allowed to open under heavy "purple tag" restrictions limiting the numbers of the public allowed in, the world of culture has been closed. Movie theaters have not opened their doors at all since March. Artists from abroad have not been allowed in for performances. Festivals and performances have moved online but the in-person experience has effectively been gone since the pandemic began. Hundreds of thousands in this sector, many of whom are independent workers, have been unemployed for nearly a year. It's a sign of the times that Time Out, the entertainment and leisure magazine/website, changed its name on its website to "Time In."

But some say that the reopening of the cultural sector could be a time for a rebirth of the arts in Israel, particularly if the government chooses to support culture and give it the means to rebuild.

Ori Reshtik, the CEO of Shaham, the Israeli Actors Guild, said: "It's a time of opportunity and danger." The opportunity, he said, is that, "people have realized how much they have missed theater and the culture world," during the long months of social distancing and lockdowns, and they will be eager to flock back to theaters.

The danger is that theaters will try to exploit actors. "There will be some who will try to take advantage of the situation and threaten the actors' salaries. We will fight for them," he said. "It will be a long recovery," particularly for theaters, which cannot mount new productions from one day to the next.

Museums, which were closed for long periods and only were able to open under many restrictions, have used the time to renovate and rethink their approach.

Israel Museum director Prof. Ido Bruno said the museum would "be reopening immediately once we receive permission from the Health Ministry... It takes us just two or three days now, we are quite proficient at it."

The large campus of the museum, which has made it an alternative study space for schools that needed extra room during the pandemic, means that, "It's a very safe space."

Looking toward the future, Bruno said that the crisis had pushed the museum staff to develop in some new directions. "Two or three beautiful things happened in...