The Artists' House in the Negev

The story

The house stands at 55 Ha-Avot Street, in the Old City, and was built in the period of the British Mandate. In 1935 Yehoshua Hankin handed it over to Dr. Reuven Meir and his wife Yehudit, so that they would set up in it a clinic that would give the Bedouin medical service without payment — its intention was to demonstrate the good will of the Jewish community in the country. Dr. Meir did not know Arabic, and his wife, a native of the country, spoke with the patients in their language; the place became a social center of Bedouin and Jews alike. In 1936 incitement against Jews began in the city, the number of patients fell, and the couple left the house and Beersheba. In 1939 Reuven Meir enlisted in the British army. Seventy years later, in 2005, the Artists' House in the Negev opened in that same building. At first fewer than ten artists worked in it as volunteers, who had been based in the area of Abraham's Well, and only artists of the Negev were invited to it, with the aim of promoting southern art; in that same year, after many difficulties, the then mayor Yaakov Terner granted the group its present home. In advance of their entry the house was renovated with funding from the Makhteshim company, and a committee for the admission of artists was set up in it. Today it has seven galleries and several painting workshops that operate on Fridays; it is managed by the Kivunim company and maintained by volunteers of the “Creators in the Negev” association.

• British Mandate
• Bedouin
• People
• Communities
• Beersheba