Withdrawal
2026, video installation, 10’17’’, video and transferred 16mm film, color, stereo, Yiddish, English and French with English subtitles
Withdrawal is a video installation by artists Sirah Foighel Brutmann and Eitan Efrat that intertwines the physical dismantling of the Jewish Museum in Brussels’ permanent exhibition with a critical examination of Jewish identity, memory, and politics.
The film documents the transition of cultural artifacts—from textiles and ritual tools to a contested 1950 map of Palestine—into storage, while incorporating 1987 footage shot in the Jewish museum in New York City.
Through montage of archival discovery and and contemporary footage, the work unfolds an exploration of themes of uprooting, the Zionist attempts to erase Palestinian history, and the tensions between Zionist narratives and anti-Zionist Jewish traditions (like the Bundist concept of doikayt/hereness). These ultimately question who defines Jewish heritage and speculate on its future.
Image and sound: Sirah Foighel Brutmann and Eitan Efrat
Featuring: Sophie Collette, Ariane Defrain, Fenya Fischler, Nilus Efrat, Rita Efrat, Olivier Vander and Olivier Hottois
New York Jewish Museum footage: A. Caspi
Additional footage: June Laka
Documentation AJAB event: Sterre Volders
Booklet design: Ot Lemmens
Text editing: Perri MacKenzie
Supported by: VGC, STUK, Messidor and Out Of Sight