*Small, Smaller | Maya Tevet Dayan | 6 Minutes on Friday | May 22, 2026*
This week I visited the “Beyond Small” exhibition at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, and it is exactly what its name promises - entirely made up of miniatures. Tiny rooms, tiny shops, tiny figures, and beautiful miniature models of Tel Aviv homes. At the entrance there’s an especially up-to-date miniature created by the artist Reny Mazor, inspired by all the people who found shelter in the Tel Aviv light rail stations during the war. There’s a tiny model of the Shaul HaMelech station, crowded with little figures of people, dogs, children, sleeping bags, all finding shelter from the bombings. It’s truly remarkable. Go see this exhibition.
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One of the artworks that was most thought provoking for me was a row of shops created by the Belgian artist Irene Spijer. She called the series “Dream Shops,” and explained that these are the kinds of shops she dreams of having within reach. There’s a bakery, a clothing boutique, an art supply store, all crafted with such care and precision that almost immediately you begin imagining yourself becoming tiny too, small enough to step inside and live amongst all that beauty.
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Spierer created them from a combination of materials including wood, metal, glass, glue, chains, and even soap, salt dough, spices, and dried leaves. But the most interesting detail, to me, is that this is an artist who comes from a very affluent background, someone who could easily have opened real versions of these shops and designed them exactly according to the same aesthetic beauty as her art. And still, she chose to leave them in the realm of imagination.
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I suppose that’s because sometimes imagining something is far more exhilarating than actually realizing it.
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And besides, sometimes focusing on what is small frees you from obsessing over what is large. And that feels especially true in times like these, in these years we are living through, when everything feels too large, unbearably difficult, impossible to fully grasp.
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Small things, though, you can hold.
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And it reminds me of advice my mother once gave me when I was twenty and heartbroken beyond repair. I didn’t want to get out of bed or go to work. I wasn’t eating. It was heartbreak in all its drama. And my mother told me that if I wanted to rise again, I had to begin with tiny movements. Not think beyond the next small action. Brush your teeth. Put on face cream. Drink some water. Don’t think beyond that. She reminded me that when Holocaust survivors arrived in Israel starving, people understood that they could not suddenly eat large quantities of food. Quite the opposite - in order to recover, they had to eat very little at first, and only gradually increase the amount.
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I remembered that this week while standing in front of the miniature exhibition at the museum. And how my mother also fed me chicken soup with tiny spoonfuls, until I could think about my next movement. And make it. And slowly regain my strength.
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And really, it is a reminder that everything created in this world begins very, very small. Even the largest tree in the forest begins with a seed you can hold between two fingers. A hurricane begins with relatively small differences in temperature and pressure over the ocean. Great loves begin with a fleeting glance. This enormous internet began with a conversation between friends. And if you’ve ever seen a baby kangaroo - born weighing only two grams - or a giant panda cub born pink and weighing about as much as half a stick of butter, then you never quite forget this power that small things possess, and how much greatness is hidden inside them.
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So this week I went to see tiny things, truly miniature things, at the museum. I left all the large things outside, and it was wonderful. I didn’t miss them at all. And when I stepped back out, I carried this knowledge with me, that we all need to remember from time to time: this is how we rise again. We begin small. One movement at a time. And we do not hesitate to leave some of the things we love in the realm of imagination.
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And then I remembered this poem I wrote when we set out on our six-year journey across the world. Back then, we reduced everything we owned to very few things. And alongside that reduction, our perspective on the world began to change. Suddenly, in the middle of life, all we had were a few suitcases. No house, no furniture. And so the weight we carried became lighter and smaller, and slowly our plans became smaller too, and everything changed. Looking back, that was another reset point in our lives. And this week, surrounded by miniatures, I found myself thinking that perhaps this moment is that kind of moment for all of us too. A reset point. And that it may truly be time to begin small again.
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So I’m concluding with this poem, from back then:
*Small, Even Smaller / Maya Tevet Dayan*
Individual packets of toothpaste
and little milk cartons with straws
were made for people like us.
Standing before family-size specials,
we hesitate.
We choose our groceries
by weight: how much can we carry?
We were never meant to run countries,
invent patents, or decide which wars
are justified. We’ll always prefer a chair
to a couch. A pillow
to a chair. We’ll lie down
on a mat, our faces turned toward the sky.
Once we thought rice was small and people were big.
The clouds were above us, and God above them.
Now we are no longer certain of anything.
We are carried by the wind.
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Wishing us all Shabbat Shalom,
*Maya Tevet Dayan*