Spot the difference: Jewish addition for iconic artwork post-Bondi

One of Australia’s best-known artworks has been given a small but significant Jewish addition by its creator in response to the terror attack at Bondi Beach.

The Bathers, created in 1989 by Sydney photo-media artist Anne Zahalka, depicts an Australian beach scene designed to represent a mix of Anglo-Celtic-European-Australian faces. Now, following the attack that left 15 people dead, Zahalka has added a “Hakoah badge” to the bottom of the main bather’s swimming costume.

The reworked image “has evolved from a desire to recognise Jewish identity within one of my most celebrated works and to amend for my lack of recognition of Jews in Bondi in the original series,” Zahalka told The Jewish Independent. “It’s also to acknowledge Bondi more broadly and its community in a positive and celebratory way, particularly in light of the recent traumatic terror event.”

The revised image, now retitled The Bondi Bathers (2026), is the centrepiece of a major touring exhibition of the artist’s work, Zahalkaworld - an artist’s archive, that will open at the Jewish Museum of Australia (JMA) in Melbourne on June 11, and an enlarged version of the artwork will be placed on the façade of the museum for the duration.

“In the making of the [original] Bathers image, I realise I'd chosen my female bather because she was a recent migrant and a Jew. This reworking is, in part, an attempt to make that identity visible,” she explains.