This is a story about what it means to be claimed by violent forces and what it looks like to refuse that claim, to choose a queer, liberatory belonging instead.

PUSH THE WATER is a politically astute memoir built around the moving image. In it, filmmaker and artist, Irit Reinheimer, weaves together descriptions of archival footage, home movies and memories that prompt new recognitions of her Jewish family’s participation in settler-colonialism and the occupation of Palestine. At the center of this investigation is a painful divide between Reinheimer and her mother, who appears in the foreground as the subject. Through this analysis of their relationship, the author seeks to understand her own connection to tradition, culture and inheritance. These dreamy and vulnerable meditations deny a reader the simple unspooling of the films themselves, asking us to consider what’s been hidden from view, as much as what’s been centered.

Co-sponsored by Hinenu and JVP Baltimore.

Irit Reinheimer is an artist and writer based in Philadelphia. Her writing is influenced by her background in experimental filmmaking, where she has taken a sculptural approach to examining themes of loss and inheritance through shorts films constructed from her late father's 8mm home movies, archival materials, and new footage. Irit's films, YOUNG, JEWISH, AND LEFT, HOW THE BRIDGE WORKS, I TOLD HER THIS WAS HOME, and OF ORIGINS have screened nationally and internationally. Beyond her artistic practices, Irit has spent over a decade working for community-based projects, and organizations focused on social change. She is also a long-time member of Jewish Voice for Peace.

Ariana Katz is the founding rabbi of Hinenu: The Baltimore Justice Shtiebl, a warm and joyful congregation in Baltimore, MD. Rabbi Ariana graduated from the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College in the spring of 2018. She is a queer white Ashkenazi femme 4th generation Philadelphian who sees rooted ritual and radical organizing as her Jewish legacy. Rabbi Ariana was the creator and host of Kaddish, a podcast about death and identity, and co-host of the forthcoming podcast God Crush with Pastor Lura Groen. She is a member of the Jewish Voice for Peace Rabbinical Council, and helps create the Radical Jewish Calendar. She is passionate about abortion clinic escorting, diaspora-made Judaica, radical Jewish calendars, care webs, and queer aesthetics.