2018
The exhibition brings together the paintings and drawings of Maya Israel, and the hanging display of sprouting sculptures of Miri Chekhanovich, calling for reflection and contemplation of the life breath present in their artwork, whether they are conveyed as open, organic drawings, bursts of color, and empty space, or whether they portray the contrast between structure and lack of control.
Miri Chekhanovich has resided over the past years in Canada, where she creates from the material matter discovered in her environment and surrounds: materials she encounters on her travels, which she transforms into objects of beauty and nourishment. The relationship between geometric structures and bursts of energy that erupt and flourish, are a part of her artistic pursuit and life flow: the same cycle of germination, growth, decay or absorption, that recurs over and over in nature.
The display, Flourish, sprouts and develops in a space at the Beita Gallery. Chekhanovich constructed the wooden frames at a Muslala wood workshop, located in this building. The display is a product of her thoughts and contemplation of the human body, and inspiration drawn from the prickly pear (tzabar) cactus blooms. It combines the stable, geometric structures, and the physical spurts and bursts of growth; roots that suggest hair, and colored threads of the human body that stretch out into the open space. During the course of the exhibition, the sculptures will continue sprouting and yielding growth, after which a new cycle will follow.
In the series, The Green Line, Chekhanovich detracts from the effect of the missing, empty spaces from maps of Israel from the early 1960s, by submerging various seeds in their place, which sprouts new seeds. The green life depicted on the map, is a perpetually fixed mark, yet at the same time alienated and estranged. A symbol of separation and conflict, it is replaced by the invigorating, free-spirited green sprouts, transforming the abstract map into something concrete and positive.
Maya Israel and Miri Chekhanovich employ two completely different approaches in their work: Israel utilizes the traditional techniques of painting, and Chekhanovich in once-off creations, in a language that is close to ecological design. However, their displays placed together, clarify the elusive potential that dwells on the boundary between dreaming and wakefulness, nature and culture, art and reality, and transforms the gallery, set in a bustling city, to a green expanse of breath and life.
Avital Naor Wexler, Curator, Translated: Hila Bar
Gallery Beta: The Art Society and the City, Jaffa 155 hotels Seidoff Jerusalem