Nine in the Dark (2009)

Solo exhibition at Dvir Gallery, Tel Aviv
Curator: Dvir Intrator

An installation of metal sculptures and paper sculptures in the gallery space. The show took place during the time period when the Hebrew year 5770 (in Hebrew) - "Tesha" sounds like the Hebrew word for the number Nine) overlapped with the Gregorian calendar year 2009. The presentation was formed out of an imaginary process related to the numeral Nine. On the gallery floor, painted in blue, were nine scattered metal sculptures, each sculpture represented one of the letters in the wording Nine in the Dark, and was designed using an Origami technique (paper folding), which has been blown up and converted to metal sheet. Three metal talismans were installed חסthe gallery walls (from Jewish tradition - religious and secular, and from Muslim tradition), blown up to a scale of approximately 2/2 meters, made of paper and cardboard. This work can be read in two parallel levels and by two "target audiences", one involves the mystical - Kabalistic, the Hebrew letter, numbers / counting and talismans - the encounter between time (the year 5770, 2009) and matter, and the randomness that led to form / image, word / sentence, and to materials and their appearance as an epic event, designed by the simulated ascent of the talismans, which are tied to the space's ceiling and from the letters drowning in the blue color of its floor. The second is related to art in itself and סtthe knowledge derived from art theories and research - the former - Jewish or Christian, and the latter (modernist). About the status of the Hebrew letter in metal sculpture and about the financial image of the appearance of the Hebrew letter in sculpture, about blowing up simple objects to enormous proportions and soft art - such as the sculptures of American Pop artist Claes Oldenburg. The Show Nine in the Dark confronts two bodies of knowledge with a situation that simulates apocalypse and salvation simultaneously.