In a rather individualistic house in a small cozy settlement somewhere in the Judean hills lives an artist. Estair Kaufman - mother of four and consciously an "aim b'Yisroel", a Jewish mother - paints images of Jerusalem, aspects of Jewish life and moments of contemplation.

How does Estair walk around the same world as we do and draw from it those scenes full of serenity, spirituality and grace? What is her artistic background? How much does her womanhood affect her work? How does she combine the laundry and the dishcloth with artistic inspiration? Does she have a mission in her work? What is she trying to tell us? How does she manage to imbue her exquisite technical excellence with real believable, wondrous beauty?

Estair cannot remember a time when she didn't carry around her magic sketching pencil to while away any spare moment. So naturally she chose to study fine arts and followed this with a course in fashion design. On completion of her studies, she entered the world of fabric design.

"I worked for some top firms whilst also producing my own collections. Yet whatever I did, the basic task was the same - to produce a solution to a design problem. There is no emotional expression in the design world, there is no sentimentality - if the design doesn't work, isn't just so, scrap it and try again. At that time my art, my paintings and my designer fabrics were purely technical pieces - solution oriented, decorative products.

"One night, though, I attended a lecture by Rabbi Meir Abehsera. He talked about the home, guests and "beautifying" faces by putting people in the right context - such very feminine issues. I couldn't help but voice my thoughts - "Where is the Jewish woman and the feminine aspect revealed in Torah?"

Rabbi Abehsera answered - in Shabbat… Shabbos, when we step back from busy, action-packed, work-filled weekday; Shabbos, when we abandon the weekday task list. On Shabbos we go into a state of "being" (feminine) as opposed to "doing" (masculine). Just like with Shabbos, the essentially feminine contribution to this world is the ability to consecrate space. Whether it is the space set apart inside woman to allow her offspring to develop and grow (biologically) or the space she sets apart by making room for others to grow and reach their potential or her ability to step back from her personal agenda to make room for Hashem.

Words - words make things sound so complex, yet my soul heard what Rabbi Abehsera was saying. The concepts, ideas and feelings behind his words burst in on my soul and I was activated with a deep, deep need to paint it out - to pour out the understanding I had reached into my paintings. For the first time, I was painting from the inside. I wanted to use the feminine quality that Hashem had blessed me with. I wanted to help bring out the wholeness and serenity in people.

Now I work mainly on commission. I go to the beautiful houses of my clients. I hear their thoughts. I see the room where the picture will be placed. I use my feminine ability to seek companionship and engage others to gather up the whole feel of my client and their family. As I paint, I think about how they will feel when they have that picture in their room on Shabbos. What effect will the picture have on them? Will the presence of the picture help their soul to soar higher and higher on the wings of Shabbos into the sanctified Shabbos space? Even though the resulting picture is a design solution, the presence of the "spiritual effect" is part of the design and "spiritual effects" can only be painted from the "inside".

I use different techniques and mediums. The effect produced can be reality-based or it can be dreamlike surrealism; the scene can be a religious theme or an everyday landscape and yet in all my works I try to create space - space filled with wholeness and serenity that can be found everywhere.

Now I have more time to give to my art. The children are older, I have an understanding husband who can tolerate things being a bit messy from time to time, and I have help with the housework. It was not always this way. When the children were younger, they needed more time and I simply painted less.

There are times when I am gripped by a total inspiration. Then I become completely lost in my work. Nothing else exists besides the creative process. At such times, putting myself away when my children need their mother is very, very difficult. Sometimes I manage to hold back the inspiration and sometimes I just have to paint fast and rely upon my very understanding husband.

This is the dilemma that many women artists grapple with. Over my years of grappling I realized that the conflict I was facing - to remain with my inspiration and continue to create my painting or to set aside my paintbrush and tend to my family's needs, was not as simple as I first thought. I saw the dilemma in terms of a sacrifice of my creativity - I had to give it up for a while. Now I see that the ultimate creativity is your family. Every little act that I do, every nuance in my speech, every encouraging pat, every special look is part of a creative process - the process of building a 'bayit ne'eman' and of stimulating and inspiring the next generation. The choice I am facing is between two sides of one creative process and the ultimate creativity is your family."

Basha Jacobs
cjacobs@bezeqint.net