Heritage & memory

Making room for the story.

Avi Tal / SPINE B7’s body of work encompasses around ten to eleven Beta Israel heritage and memorial spaces, including projects in Jerusalem, Beit Shemesh, Afula, Yokneam, Beersheva, Lod, Hadera and Kiryat Ono. These photographs bring together rooms, installations and details from that work across Israel.

For Avi, the starting point is care: a wish to give a community’s history a dignified presence. He sees Beta Israel’s story as too often pushed to the margins of Israeli public life, overlooked or represented in ways that do not do it justice. The work grows from a commitment to preserving memory and making that heritage tangible.

Most of these projects were carried out on exceptionally small budgets. Payment largely covered expenses and left a very small profit margin, bringing much of the work close to volunteering. Avi took it on because he believed it mattered, even when the financial return was minimal.

The spaces combine photographs, historical timelines, sculpture, textiles, pottery, musical instruments and everyday objects. Together they connect life in Ethiopia, the journey to Israel and the memory of those who never arrived. The sculpture “Voices in Silence” forms part of this approach to remembrance.

Developed through Shidrah Studio in collaboration with Amram Aklum, whose historical knowledge and lived experience are central to the process, the work brings content, spatial design and hands-on making into a complete environment.