Anna Fine Foer
Anna Fine Foer decided she was going to be an artist when she was 11-when she lived in Paris for a summer, visiting every museum and gallery. While a fibers/crafts major at Philadelphia College of Art (now University of the Arts) she became fascinated by the relationship between maps and the land they represent, embarking on a lifelong interest in landscape and topography, depicted with collaged images.
After emigrating to Israel, Anna worked as a textile conservator in Haifa and Tel-Aviv. She studied at the Textile Conservation Centre, Courtauld Institute in London, where she received a Post Graduate Diploma in Textile Conservation. Back in the US, Anna worked in conservation for the Textile Museum in Washington, D.C and for many museum clients as a freelance textile conservator. At the same time, she continued to construct collage landscapes with scientific, political and meta-physical significance, depicting three or more dimensions on a two dimensional plane.
Anna now lives in Baltimore and has two adult sons. Her work has been exhibited at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Maryland Governor’s Mansion, and the Israeli Embassy and is in the permanent collection of the Haifa Museum of Art and the Beer-Sheva Biblical Museum. She was awarded a prize for the Encouragement of Young Artists for work exhibited in the Artist’s House in Jerusalem and received a Maryland State Arts Council grant for Individual Artists in 2008, 2016 and 2021.
Artist Statement
My artwork is map collage that offers the viewer a combination of imaginary landscapes with mystical, biblical, scientific and ecological themes. The visual description of a three-dimensional world on a flat plane is conjoined with the depiction of the metaphysical.
The focus of my work is combining imagery that illustrates passages from the Torah with the more secular concepts I deal with. My use of contemporary images, symbols and metaphors while working with Torah stories shows the adaptability and applicability of the stories across the millennia.
I strive to find common ground between these seemingly disparate realms. Maps that I incorporate into collages may be part of regional, geographic, geological, or religious narratives. There is more than one story a map can convey. My work also has more than one story to tell. I may be both trying to describe the curve of the earth on a flat piece of paper and using maps to blur boundaries between the natural and the manufactured/technological world, representing simultaneously land, sky, water and architecture.
My work is made in a traditional way; constructed with paper and adhesive. Technology allows me to duplicate and manipulate images to fit my ideas.
Etz haSadeh (A Tree In A Field)
In February 2001 the Journal Nature published an image of the first complete human DNA sequence and a molecular biologist at NIH, (who actually understands this) had the foresight to give me the journal to use the images in a collage. Many years later I decided how to make the best use of the data. A quote from the Torah "for man is like a tree in a field" is a declaration that Hebrew soldiers must not destroy trees on conquered land. That inspired me to use the DNA in the form of a tree, with some human aspects. The result is an example of my creative blending of science and Torah.
Anna Fine Foer, Etz haSadeh, 2023
Materials: Collage with 3D paper shapes