On the roof of the famed holy sepulcher church in the old city of Jerusalem, lives a group of monks from Ethiopia.
Heirs to a rich and ancient monastic tradition in their country and claiming king Salomon as forefather, they are ancient dwellers of Jerusalem.
Christian interdenominational battles for control on the holy sites relegated them out of the church, but they made of necessity a virtue and built their abide with pride on top of it, on what, they say, is the site of the sacrifice of Itzhak.
They speak Tigrinya, but some of them also English, Arabic, or Hebrew. They pray, talk, interact with pilgrims, safeguard their spot on the roof as a treasure. And they give us all, the gift of ‘a slice of Africa’ in Jerusalem.
CHAIM MARTELLO
“My artistic practice is well anchored in the classical tradition of street and documentary photography. I step quietly into a space,
I observe it, and at times I photograph.
Humanity is my persistent subject and my language.
For this project, I’m doing portraits of people as well as “portraits” of a place.
I am not “sitting” my “sitters”. We talk, and they go along with their life, that I only ask them to stop for a fraction of a second.
I portray them, as well as my relationship with them, my fascination with their gazes and the space they inhabit.”
