The sculpture installations by artists Gil Yefman and Shay Id Alony, created with community participation or with a link to the neighbourhood, are rich in iconography and religious icons whose symbolism has been deconstructed and reconstructed. Yefman draws upon Jewish texts, revising Ezekiel’s “Vision of the Dry Bones” and other myths, while Id Alony is inspired by ritual objects.

In the Vision of the Wet Bones Gil Yefman presents a sculptural object made in collaboration with the community, partnering with Rishon Lezion schoolchildren in an educational ecological action. The installation marks out a stage in a continuous pedagogical process in which students helped gather up plastic bags, deconstructed, knitted and crocheted and planted, or, in the words of the artist, “they beat their swords into threads [Hebrew pun on hoes/threads/hittim/hutim] and their spears into knitting needles” [Hebrew pun mazmerot/masregot].

Yefman has built an installation from these knitted and crocheted limbs, examining the role of the artist as one who constructs mythologies, “heals,” and repairs the world as the artist attempts, in his own words, “to transform toxins into medicine,” responding to ecological blight. The artist proposes actions moving between faith and scepticism, ransoming the land while simultaneously holding on to the possibility of reparation and healing. Thus he remains a nomad who arrives for a set time and then departs.

* This installation is a further development of the project that Yefman installed in the Lakeside Museum, Ichihara, Japan.

Shay Id Alony juggles between rituals, architectural structures, and athletic devices. At the center of the installation Borderline Project, a site-specific artwork constructed for the Gallery space, stand “the guys” – wooden sculptures reminiscent of totem poles bearing soccer balls and game pieces, whose placement was inspired by ceremonial rituals and team sports. An additional source of inspiration is the continuous line of buildings between the Ramat Eliyahu neighbourhood characterized by Ethiopian immigrants, and between the western quarters undergoing neighbourhood renewal, built as a kind of “barrier bloc.” The title, Border/Line/Field is a concept common to field sports and architectural construction, defining the borderlines in which a building may be constructed as well as the rules of the game.

Opening: Thursday, May 5, 2015
Artists: Shay Id Alony, Gil Yefman
Curator: Orit Hasson (Walder)