NEW YORK, NY.- Forum Gallery presents Sharing The Journey: The Haggadah, an exhibition of new paintings and drawings by Mark Podwal, from February 14 to March 7, 2012. The exhibition celebrates the publication of the new Reform Haggadah of the same title, published by the CCAR Press, Division of the Central Conference of America Rabbis, in which Podwal’s works serve as illustrations.

Mark Podwal is the New York artist who received a 50th Anniversary Jewish Cultural Achievement Award from The Foundation for Jewish Culture on December 13, 2011. He has collaborated with authors Elie Wiesel (The Golem), Francine Prose (You Never Know) and Harold Bloom (Fallen Angels) and his original works may be found in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), the Victoria and Albert Museum (London), the Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA) and the Library of Congress (Washington).

In 2011, Mark Podwal was commissioned to design embroidered textiles for Prague’s seven hundred year old Altneuschul, the oldest active synagogue in Europe. An exhibition of his works, Jewish Magic, is scheduled to open at the Jewish Museum in Prague on July 11, 2012. Mark Podwal and Academy Award- winning filmmaker Allan Miller produced the documentary, House of Life, about the old Jewish cemetery in Prague, which was broadcast on PBS in 2009 and 2010.

Sharing The Journey exhibits twenty-six colorful paintings that relate the story of Passover. Working in the pictorial language of symbol and metaphor, Podwal’s approach to the Passover story is at once respectful, personal, and universal in its appeal.