Venetian Jewish Culture in Comics is a project that explores the richness of Venetian Jewish culture through ever-evolving artistic forms, aiming to engage a wide and diverse audience—including younger readers.
The project features artists Julia F. Tzaisler and David Duvshani, who came to Venice as artists-in-residence in October 2023 to deepen their understanding of local Jewish history and life, coinciding with the Jewish autumn festivals. Their illustrated book, Sogni d’acqua (Dreams of Water), tells a story set in the Venice Ghetto, seen through the eyes of a young Israeli girl who travels to Venice and falls in love with its Jewish heritage. Published by Casa Editrice Giuntina in 2025, the book is currently available in Italian only, but we’re working on a version in English and Hebrew!
About the book
Manu arrives in Venice for the Passover holidays, eager to discover the magic of the city on water. But among its bridges, calle (narrow streets), and a visit to the Jewish Museum, her imagination takes flight—transforming reality into a journey where past and present meet in a play of reflections and dreams.
What if Moses had been cradled by the lagoon’s waters? What if the Red Sea had parted amid the gondolas? It’s an adventure between dream and discovery, where Venice becomes the setting for an ancient biblical story.
—————-
Manu arriva a Venezia per le vacanze di Pesach, pronta a scoprire la magia della citta’ sull’acqua. Ma tra ponti, calli e una visita al Museo ebraico, la sua fantasia prende il volo, trasformando la realtà in un viaggio dove passato e presente si in contrano in un gioco di riflessi e immaginazione. E se Mose’ fosse stato cullato dalle acque della laguna? E se il Mar Rosso si aprisse tra le gondole? Un’avventura tra sogno e scoperta, dove Venezia diventa lo scenario di un’antica storia biblica.
Questa notte é diversa da tutte le notti.
Le stelle gia’ splendono nel cielo
ma Manu non chiude occhio.
Quando il sole sorgera’
lei salira’ su un aereo
per la prima volta in vita sua.
Andrà in vacanza per Pesach
con mamma e papa’, in Italia.
E non solo, andra’ nella citta’ dei canali:
a Venezia!
Acquista il libro | Buy the book now
About the artists
Julia Fermentto-Tzaisler is a prominent Israeli writer and cultural organizer who directs the Jerusalem International Book Forum. A successful novelist, her work has been translated into several languages and published in countries such as Germany, Poland, the United States, and the United Kingdom. During her studies—culminating in a Ph.D. in American and Yiddish literature from the University of California, San Diego—she also lived and studied in Venice at the Venice International University on San Servolo Island. There, she developed a deep love for the city and learned Italian.
David Duvshani is an artist who works with comics, painting, and printmaking. He graduated from the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the prestigious Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Tel Aviv. His works have been exhibited in galleries across Israel (Almacen Gallery, Tel Aviv; Raw-Art Gallery, Tel Aviv; Mishkan Museum of Art, Ein Harod; Nachum Gutman Museum, Tel Aviv) and internationally (White Night, Paris; FOURFold Gallery, London). He has published the comic Apocalyptic Predictions in the newspaper Haaretz and The Travels of Reb Mendelovitch in the magazine Tohu. In 2018, his artist’s book Crusades was published in France with a launch event at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris.
Partners in life and art, Julia Fermentto-Tzaisler and David Duvshani recently collaborated on the graphic novel Bad Butcher, for which Julia wrote the text and David created the illustrations. This work inspired Beit Venezia to involve them in this new, similar project—an invitation the two artists enthusiastically accepted.
Progetto sviluppato nell’ambito delle iniziative per il Giorno della Memoria e co-finanziato dalla Regione Veneto.
