I’m sitting in front of the TV. Terrible pictures are running.
I can’t believe my eyes. I turned on the radio. The news on the radio is even more terrifying.
I closed the windows and doors firmly.
Through the window I saw Sveta.
Is it possible that it is her?
She stands for a while in front of the window.
I get up from my armchair to see her and she is gone.
Our whole life together rans before my eyes. I missed her.
Was that my Sveta?
I started the painting at the day I heard the news “A war has begun in Ukraine”. 24.2.2020.
I grabbed a canvas and made some quick coloured marks. Quick scratch.
I knew what I saw and felt.
I saw the red curtains in his living room, the beautiful bouquet of tulips, the small wooden table. I saw a middled-aged man sitting frozen in his armchair, after hearing and seeing the news. Than he saw Sveta by the window. He got up immediately, to see her closely, but she is gone.
Than I remember that I saw a reflation of a man’s face, blurry, fare from the window, behind Sveta’s shoulder.
Was it the middled-aged man’s reflection on the window, when he got up from his armchair?
Or was it the man that accompanied Sveta?
I drew the man’s face reflected in the window, it felt right.
I thought I finished the painting, and left it for a while.
Over time, in February 2023, a year after I started the painting, it was clear to me that there was a moment when Sveta looked straight ahead, looked directly into the man’s face and he looked at her.
There was a clear meeting – face to face of the two, for a split second, and then she disappeared.
I created 25 minimalist sculptures, in cube forms, that raises topics on social, political and environmental issues.
Enclosing some sculptures in the project. Some other are in previous posts.
It took me four blessed years to work on the project, 2014 – 2018.
All the wooden cubes are found objects. The cubes are fortunate now to have another life, as sculptures; carrying important messages.
With a stroke of paint, in black, red, turquoise etc., the themes are revealed to the world to attract the attention of the people, so these important subjects can be dealt with.
It was a challenge to incorporate subliminal social messages, universal concepts and social issues in small wooden cubes, to create meaningful minimalistic work.
These ideas have been bubbling in my head for a while. They got a form & shape and grow out to be a new form from each cube, and the subject matter became one with the cube. In a way, each cube’s unique form, character and texture leads me.
I sand, scrub and polish each cube, to reveal the beauty of the wood, the texture and its specific qualities.
Each cube represents a universal subject.
Each cube slowly reveals its secrets to me. Some were nearly in perfect form but the wood was painted brutally, covering its qualities. Others, their ugly form and deformed shape inspired me to bring up ideas I wanted to present.
Wood, metal, acrylic, oil, tar, plastic, varnish. Sizes of cubes vary between 7 – 10 cm².
Primary – the life of an individual is most important.
The Corona crisis in the Western countries and in Israel, has been characterized primarily as a health crisis, with scientific aspects and economic consequences.
The political crisis emerging under the health and economic crisis has no less serious consequences than the consequences of the Corona itself.
Under the health crisis that the Western democracies have taken on to, a public & political crisis has also been revealed.
Extraordinary powers that the public gives to its governments, must serve only the purpose for which they were given: suppressing the disease in Corona and balancing the other violations of individual rights created as a result.
The Corona crisis created in some countries “legal” circumstances for “temporary” emergency laws that restricts civil rights on the pretext of the “public good”. Also created an unequal enforcement between different populations.
The excuse of spreading the virus deprives the individual citizen of his civil rights, allowing the government and the state to enforce civil laws while the citizens are mentally and physically in weak condition.
Individual rights Should be kept at all times and atthe times of Corona plague.
Tomer Ganun from Calcalist; Israeli newspaper: 23.3.2020 (Above)
“Individual rights do not “survive” throughthe Corona plague.“
Protecting the rights of the individual is not a privilege in an emergency. On the contrary, it is mandatory. The bridle must not be removed. Supervision of the information collected about us, the citizens and its use.
The balance between preserving the public and preserving its right to privacy must not be compromised. Giving up here is dangerous and doomed to disaster. It gives wide discretion to various parties – the Shaback (Secret police), the Police, the Ministry of Health – who may abuse their power in the name of protecting the public.
My work is inspired by: Guernica by Picasso & 1984, A Novel by George Orwell