Art Imitating (National ) Life

Wednesday, September 18, 2013 | | Wednesday, September 18, 2013 B7 Wednesday,Art imitatingsePTeMbeR 18, 2013 (national ) life Much more than a coffee-table album, Yigal Zalmona’s survey of Israeli art’s first 100 years offers an insightful ’of Israeli society itself. In his narrative, the larger world ‘makes frequent appearances הוראותvalues לעידכון changing התאריך:look at the 1. עדכון התאריך בכל השטחים Ruth Kestenbaum artists toward the East, and in receive in-depth consider- the penultimate image in the Ben-Dov particular toward the image ation. These are specifically book, offers a potent metaphor -Arab, versus .2 their re- the ones presented as over- for re-framing the linear pas בחירת the כליof חץ שחור )F1( “A Century of Israeli Art,” by Yigal lationship with the West. Dis- turning the hegemonic Is- sage from wholeness to disin- -this issue . in3 relation to raeli narrative − a change in tegration that is traced in Zal בחירה by cussing מהתפריט: FileZalmona > (English Export edition edited Anna Barber ), Lund Humphries, in the earlier works in the book, emphasis that says a lot about mona’s account, into a cyclical association with the Israel Museum, Zalmona writes: “In some re- the ideological transformation and unending one, as the circle the Zionist .4 view of the that the Israeli cultural elite, of floating watermelons and בחירה ,spectsבאופציה PDFsterling )זהpages, 45 pounds בדרך 512כלל נמצא במצב הזה(. East is a specific example of of which the author is a mem- body unravels but is then rec- hough one may Orientalist ideology, that is, ber, has undergone, while also reated (and unraveled again ). perception .5 of the reflecting worldwide post- The above discussion of החלפתof a Western -הקובץ leaf בקודםWE.pdfenjoy( simply(. ing through the East. At the same time, how- modern tendencies. Works meaningful voices from past high-quality re- ever, the East is the ancient that are read by Zalmona as and present that are absent productions in “A source of the Jews’ history and representing post-Zionist ap- from “A Century of Israeli TCentury of Israeli Art,” by ultimate destination as they proaches are now granted cen- Art” does not discredit its Yigal Zalmona, it is worth return to that source ... And ter stage, and even regarded content but rather opens the the challenge of reading the to complicate the question of as representing the main- door to different ones. Docu- text, which offers an incisive who identifies with whom even stream mindset among today’s menting a relatively new look at Israel’s visual arts and further, the Jew knew that in young Israeli artists. In this canon of art should be done how they reflect a changing Europe, he himself was the context, he presents Adi Ness’ via the acknowledged artists society. The original Hebrew Semitic Other. In other words: photographs of male soldiers and movements within it. It is version accompanied the 2010 For Christian Europeans, the as “critiques of the mythology then the role of those unseen opening of the first permanent East was just ‘there’; for the of the Israel Defense Forces,” and unheard to question that exhibition of Israeli art at the Jews, it was simultaneously in their subversive stance to- canon and tell their alternative Israel Museum in Jerusalem, ‘there’ and ‘here.’” ward the ethic of self-sacri- stories. where Zalmona, who is also an The descriptions and anal- The Israel Museum, Jerusalem / Elie Posner fice, as well as through their In terms of structure, art critic and historian, served ysis of numerous artworks in “First Fruits,” by Reuven Rubin (1923). Collection Rubin Museum, Tel Aviv © Estate of the artist. hints of homoeroticism. “A Century of Israeli Art” for decades in various senior the book refer to this tension. It is intriguing to con- progresses chronologically, curatorial positions. For example, in “The Four Ma- template who the current divided in large part into Both the exhibition and the triarchs,” by Abel Pann (1935 ). unfashionable-yet-serious chapters devoted to indi- book are players in a larger This European-born painter others are, whose work is vidual decades. Thankfully, ongoing cultural enterprise imagined the biblical fore- now being marginalized − this structure is not adhered involving the mapping of what mothers as a group of Bedouin certainly not those who forgo to strictly, and cross-cutting may be called the canon of lo- women, natives of the East, yet complexity and questioning, themes, short biographies of cal art. The past five years portrayed them using Western but perhaps those who reject individual artists, and in the have been good ones for this realistic painting techniques. such a sweeping definition case of the statue “Nimrod,” effort, as can be seen − in ad- Reuven Rubin celebrated as “the paralyzing ideologi- a definitive work of art, are dition to the Israel Museum’s the birth of the Zionist pioneer cal charisma of rootedness” allowed to deviate from the new Israeli art galleries − in a as the “new Jew” in “First (which Zalmona deems one form. Though at times this series of shows and catalogs in Fruits” (1923 ), using the Chris- of the causes of today’s art- reader felt that an obligation six different museums, on the tian format of the triptych ists’ attraction to previously to include all “famous” Israeli occasion of Israel’s 60th year to lend sanctity to the scene, taboo themes), and who seek artists threatened to weigh of independence (with each yet eschewing Western per- new forms of community and down the book, for the most museum responsible for a de- spective in favor of a simpler belonging. A search for con- part it manages to transmit cade ); the recent opening of and more innocent Eastern nection may then become an enormous amount of infor- the Israeli art wing at the Tel (including Eastern Christian ) visible from within works mation while relating a deep Aviv Museum of Art; and now view of the landscape and its previously interpreted as art-historical saga. This feat the excellent English transla- inhabitants. The latter include primarily deconstructing an is accomplished by main- tion of Zalmona’s book. the muscular and partially un- The Israel Museum, Jerusalem / by Avshalom Avital existing ethos, such as many taining a close connection Heavy both in literary and dressed pioneering man and “The Four Matriarchs,” by Abel Pann (1926). Collection of Itiel of Ness’ photographs. with the visual experience figurative terms, the text de- woman, bearing the fruits of Pann © Estate of the artist. Sigalit Landau’s “DeadSee,” throughout, giving great re- scribes local art through the their labor. To their left is a spect to the artworks them- lens of the discourse of iden- modestly dressed Yemenite for Israelis, both a threaten- artists are featured relatively selves, and drawing insights tity − or more accurately, iden- Jewish couple with a naked ing signifier of violence, yet prominently, other outlooks from their detailed study. tities − in an attempt to follow baby, who are also presented also a reminder of a not-so- and works − pre-Zionist, East- Though women Indeed, there are moments the development of complex as part of the middle panel, distant past when it was worn ern, and both local religious artists are featured, in the book that remind us and often contradictory trends reflecting the central theme by sabra farmers and fighters Jewish and non-Jewish ones − that alongside awareness of that combine to form a distinct of Jewish re-connection with The Israel Museum Jerusalem/ Avraham Hay as a sign of belonging to the are given marginal, perhaps other outlooks and the socio-political context Israeli culture. Thus, art, so- the land. Their Easternness “Keffiyeh (Homage to Asim Abu Shakra)” (1992). land and region. The dialogue token, attention throughout works − pre-Zionist, of art there remains the ba- ciety and historic events are renders them “authentic rep- Collection IMJ, purchase, Recanati Fund for the with the keffiyeh is further most of the book. When they sic and personal experience viewed here as intertwined. resentatives of the pre-exilic Acquisition of Israeli Art © Tsibi Geva. deepened when analyzed are included, they fulfill the Eastern, and both of a viewer being moved by In the opening words of the through an art historical per- role of “others” in relation to religious Jewish and a single work, such as the author, “Our story will be told spective: On the one hand, it is the main drama. two loving and poetic pages with particular attention to a flat, Eastern decorative pat- non-Jewish ones − devoted to Yehezkel Streich- the ways in which art derives tern that comes from “low” Overturning the are given marginal man’s 1951 “Portrait of and receives meaning from folk art; on the other, a grid, narrative Tsila” − a study of the mak- its socio-political context. which is the basic template of attention. When ings of home, family and The world, therefore, makes American modernist abstract It is in the latter part of included, they fulfill painting itself, all in an inti- frequent appearances, even if art in its search for the sub- “A Century of Israeli Art,” the role of ‘others’ in mate Tel Aviv interior. art is our main protagonist.” lime. In Zalmona’s reading, describing contemporary Ruth Kestenbaum Ben-Dov is a It is interesting to discover though Geva realized that he art, when certain divergent relation to the main painter living in the Galilee. Her that the thinking behind this could not escape his Western viewpoints and identities drama. website is at www.ruthkbd.com. assertion is revealed as hav- artistic consciousness, he ing been a source of dispute could comment about him- among Israeli artists − over self and his attitude to the the New Horizons movement East through expropriating (in 1950), which supported the motifs such as the keffiyeh autonomous nature of local and using them in a Western art, after decades of ideologi- artistic discourse, enabling cally charged work in the ser- viewers “to experience the vice of Zionist nation-building chronic Israeli vacillation − although such a declaration, between identities.” too, also reflects an aspect of The above small taste from Israeli reality that strives to- this extensive volume re- ward normalcy.

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