Jerusalem: The Tulip and the Thorn
Maty Grunberg – Images, Dr. Michael Avishai – Flora, Amos Oz – Words

Artist Maty Grunberg, who drew inspiration for this project from the Jerusalem Botanical Garden on Mount Scopus, sets the scene: Jerusalem, built on a ridge of hills, lies on a watershed line – rain falls mainly on the northern and western slopes, leaving desert conditions to east and south. Furthermore its height and geography cause annual extremes of scorching heat or freezing cold. Despite this, as Dr. Michael Avishai explains, "There is a diversity of plant life that is unparalleled in most places on earth, and that survives on these hills, in spite of more than three thousand years of human history, fire, goats and sheep".
Jerusalem's native wild flowering plants are at the heart of this fine art print portfolio; among them 18 selected species illuminate a metaphor: that the varied characters of plant types, with their survival strategies and adaptations, mirror the situations that exist in Jerusalem among the different human populations. 
Picture
Amos Oz, Contributed to this project with text extarcts from his memoir, "A Tale of love and Darkness", 2002. These were selected for the sublime, atmospheric perspective on life in Jerusalem during the British Mandet and the War of Independence.

Yair Medina - Jerusalem Fine Art Print Workshop