“Were You Cold?”: Michal Heiman’s Artistic Project as an Example of “Horizontal Toledot”

As a way to explore textual connections, especially the power of the text to establish a connection, I will present a new narrative and cultural pattern in contemporary Hebrew literature and Israeli art that I have defined as "horizontal toledot". This pattern integrates the inscription in a cultural context with the search and creation of a genealogical line that is no longer linear, hierarchical, and prescriptive, but horizontal and made of encounters. More precisely it is made by the others` stories, especially the ones who has been suppressed in the search for universal symbols, as well as the story of the self as narrated by them. Horizontal narratives, then, that become stories and history by creating a family where one can welcome others as well as feel welcomed.
To describe how the “horizontal toledot” shape several literary and artistic practices in Hebrew literature and contemporary Israeli art, I will present one example taken from an art project by Michal Heiman. I will discuss how the story of the other that has been suppressed may become part of a personal and cultural conversation by describing this practice according to one of the Megillot in Heiman’s project Hatqafot ‘al ḥibbur, Attacks on linking, 2008, namely the one dedicated to Edvard Munch`s painting Puberty. The way the text allows to establish this connection will be put in the context of the artist practices as well as of the “horizontal toledot” pattern.