Lawrence Halprin: Landscape Architecture in Israel

Lawrence Halprin, Self-Portrait before Leaving Israel, 1998

Courtesy of Anna Halprin

As a teenager, the land of Israel captivated Lawrence Halprin (1916–2009). In 1929, at 13, he marked the ritual transition into Jewish adulthood and responsibility (bar mitzvah) in Jerusalem (then British-governed Palestine Mandate), where he and his family were living at the time. In 1933, at 17, he returned there for two years. 

During this time, Halprin joined a group of pioneer men and women involved in the utopian kibbutz movement, which established collective, socialist societies (kibbutzim, Hebrew for “gatherings”) based on agriculture.

Anna Halprin: “Jews Are a Dancing People”

Anna Halprin: “Jews Are a Dancing People”

Anna Halprin Leading a Women’s Peace Walk on the Rhoda Goldman Promenade, Israel, 2014

Courtesy of Sue Heinemann

Anna Halprin (front row, center) leads a peace procession on the Rhoda Goldman Promenade designed by her late husband, the renowned landscape architect Lawrence Halprin. Next to her (our left) is Susie Gelman, daughter of Richard Goldman, who commissioned the promenade.

Photographer Sue Heinemann remembers traveling to Israel with the postmodern dance legend Anna Halprin in the fall of 2014: “There she completed her trilogy Remembering Lawrence, honoring her late husband, who helped found an early kibbutz and designed several Jerusalem landmarks. Anna led over a hundred Jewish, Muslim, Christian, and Druze women on a silent peace walk along the Goldman Promenade, designed by Larry, situated between East and West Jerusalem.”