Serial No. 3817131

Description

At the age when sexual, educational and family values are at their highest exploration point, the lives of Israeli teenage girls are interrupted. They are trained as soldiers in the Israeli Defense Forces, a rigorous institution where individuality comes second to nationalism. Under a militaristic, masculine environment engaged in daily conflict, these girls must become women. Rachel Papo, who was Serial No. 3817131, explores the personal, complex and delicate spectrum of emotions inherent in all adolescents, exposing the vulnerable side of the righteous soldier.

American-born Israeli Rachel Papo began working as a photojournalist in the late 1990s and graduated from the School of Visual Arts with an MFA in photography in 2005. Works from Serial No. 3817131 are in several public and private collections; have been exhibited at Griffin Museum of Photography, Boston; the 92nd Street Y, New York; Paul Kopeikin Gallery, Los Angeles; and Photographic Center Northwest, Seattle; and, have been published in the U.S., Germany, Israel, Switzerland, Spain, France, Brazil, Estonia, Hong Kong, China, and Turkey. Papo has won many awards, including selection as a finalist for the Santa Fe Prize for Photography and a 2006 NYFA Fellowship. She lives in Brooklyn.