Read: *How to create an ancestral altar at home: A cross-cultural guide* [NPR article] - PDF
Listen: to the accompanying NPR podcast [24 minutes]
Create: a portal, shrine or altar by collecting and curating objects that are meaningful to you. Be sure to include a light source or reflective material.
Photograph: your altar and post it in the assignments forum. If your altar is too sacred to share, draw it and describe it in detail (2-3 paragraphs).
Altars are not a common practice among contemporary American Jews, and historically speaking, I am fairly sure they were mostly built for the rituals surrounding certain holidays (candle sticks/menorahs, whatever food and drink relate to the particular holiday). Altars were not something I grew up with, and I didn’t bring anything to New York related to my Jewish heritage or my grandparents. But looking around my apartment for what I could use, I realized that the love they instilled in me for art and music and performance can be found in just about everything I have, so I made a pivot, and created an Altar to Dance and Rock and Roll instead, honoring the artists that came before me and forged a path for me to be able to create as well (a path I would not be on if my grandparents had not nurtured it in me).
The altar is simple (and unfortunately on the floor because of the size of some of my objects) and will be disassembled once I am done photographing it so the objects can go back into their normal places (I also use most of these objects regularly). They include records by my favorite artists - rock albums meant to be danced to (Dance Fever by Florence and the Machine and Rumors by Fleetwood Mac), my bass guitar, disco ball, LaDuca Boots, books on artists and art periods I love, a guitar pic, and of course, a candle. I’m now calling it my Altar to the Rock and Roll Gods.
(I did also just start the Daisy Jones and The Six show on Amazon Prime, if you were wondering. If I could include a TV show in my altar or had a copy of the physical book, I would.)