Yavni Bar-Yam

Sefaria is a massive digital library of Jewish texts. Between 2023 and 2026, they hired me to curate sources for over 150 Topic Pages, including pages for all of the Torah portions.

The Jewish Learning Collaborative provides customized, learner-focused, 1:1 Jewish learning. I have been one of their educators since 2022, learning with 16 Jewish professionals and fellowship participants for hundreds of hours to date. You can see my educator profile here.

Valley Beit Midrash is a center for Jewish learning and social justice action headed by Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz. Since 2023, I have written over fifty of their podcast episodes, courses, and op eds, on Torah, Jewish thought, social justice, philosophy, and psychology.

Dreaming the World to Come is a radical, Jewish year planner produced by the Signal Fire Artist Cooperative. They invited me to contribute an interactive short story for the month of Tammuz in their 5786 (2025-6) edition.

Halachic Left is a grassroots organization working to shift the conversation on Israel and Palestine in traditionally observant Jewish communities. I have contributed to their Torah publications, organized and facilitated their book club, and I designed their logo.

"They laughed so hard that night that their faces fell off..."
My story "How It Happened" was published in the Winter/Spring 2025 issue of Ilanot Review and nominated for the PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. You can read it here or watch a video of me reading it here.

My translation of and commentaries on a little-known Chasidic story were published by Gashmius Magazine in January 2025, under the title "I Myself Heard."

BCI is a historic young adult summer program of Jewish learning, creative expression, personal exploration, and community formation. I was on the arts faculty of the program in 2016, 2017, 2019, facilitating an intensive workshop in puppetry arts, and for the online alumni programming in 2020, facilitating a workshop in midrashic writing.

The Teshuva Puzzle Process is a course of personal growth and wellbeing developed by Rabbi Marcelo Bronstein and offered in various settings and formats. In 2021, he commissioned me to create a spiritual workbook to accompany his program.

Rabbi Getzel Davis's organization ZIVUG offers courses and pastoral care to couples and individuals. From 2021 to 2023, I supported his work by composing emails and social media posts, editing sermons, planning and executing publicity, corresponding with clients, partners and students, laying out source sheets and other materials, maintaining the website, mailing lists, and calendar, and designing the logo.

Aside from mostly more ephemeral, live puppetry, I have done some video puppetry: Found-object puppetry with Denise Rogers Valenzuela as "Hermit Appendage," and just before the pandemic hit, I began a project of experimental Jewish-holiday-themed puppetry called "Ears for Fruit."

The Ashkenaz Festival, in Toronto, is one of the largest and most prestigious showcases of Jewish music and culture in the world. I was a part of the planning and creation team for the puppet parade of the 2018 festival.

The National Havurah Committee is a pluralistic, egalitarian, Jewish community that centers around an annual summer gathering. I was Artist in Residence in 2016, and I have facilitated courses including found-object puppetry and the six days of creation, shadow puppetry for Sukkot, mask-making for mourning and comforting, commedia dell’Arte and aggadic midrash, and Zoom, et al as an artistic storytelling medium. Between 2019 and 2022 I chaired the Artist in Residence recruitment/selection/guidance committee and served as a member on the Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion committee.

Live Up! is a Jewish creative and relational play ecosystem developed by Karina and Debora Zilberman. During 2021 and 2022, I assisted them with written materials including grant reports and video scripts.