Page 50 - Studio International - March 1972

the problems which are evident to him. spirit, with the object merely defining itself Yardeni exchanged the boards for branches,
For example, the 'sculpture' which Israel through form. this time in order to integrate natural elements
Hadany (b. 1941) set up in the square outside with an industrial product.
the Jerusalem railway station. This is a rather TESTIMONY, PROOF, QUESTIONS There are combinations and encounters in
free placing of scrap iron, twisted bars, the Until now we have remained in the realm of the the works of Moshe Gershuni (b. 1936) too.
sides of which the artist painted. This appears object which is more a symbol than a form, and But they stem more from poetic impulses than
to be merely an environmental sculpture in a remaining representational, is shaped with an from assumptions based on a purposeful line
public square and no more. In fact it is a expressive aim. With other artists, whose of thought leading to a synthesis. They are
transformed objet trouvé. It had existed earlier importance has begun to make itself evident in born of associations rather than attempting to
as a scrap heap in the No-Man's-Land between the last two years, reality itself becomes the create them, and they remain in the visual realm
the two sectors of Jerusalem. In the 1967 war, medium, far from monuments and far from which gives testimony rather than interrogating
the bars became twisted by the heat of the exhibitions and museums. It is treated in two or proving. When Gershuni observes nature he
shells. When it was decided to rehabilitate the main ways : the one dealing with open or closed gathers samples of sand in his yard and frames
area, the artist saw an opportunity to make use spaces and with problems of definition and them like a butterfly collector; when he is
of the bars, which had assumed a symbolic expression, and the other, with the creation of invited to participate in the annual autumn
significance, in order to add an expressive meanings and concepts through the activation exhibition in the Tel Aviv Museum, where the
formal element to an empty and characterless of creative processes or by using elements from hall is cut by a row of columns, he crowns them
square. Thus, the work embodied a double nature. A series of activities and situations, with capitals made of coloured feathers or
meaning, both symbolic and functional. ranging from naturalism to the most extreme numbers them; when he is dealing with his
Another example can be seen in the metamorphoses have been given form in works `personal mythology' he creates an emotional
ambitious project of Ezra Orion (b. 1934), an created over a short period by groups and relationship between himself and a certain point
art teacher at an agricultural school in the individuals in various places in Israel. In these in time and marks a circle around his
Negev (the south of Israel). His home is works, the artist emerges as a witness, a great-grandfather's head in an old family
surrounded by barren hills devoid of plants or researcher, or an interrogator. photograph.
trees (in a country where the tree is the most Yeheskiel Yardeni (b. 1934) belongs to the
incisive evidence of cultural presence). The first type, though to a certain extent he bridges IDENTIFICATION: DISCOVERY, ADAPTATION,
project is entitled 'Sculpture City'. It is based between the self-contained object and the object REACTION
on the idea of concentrating in a given area concerned with space definition. In an Gershuni's identification with his immediate
giant structures having an architectural environmental exhibition which he held in the surroundings is from another point of view that
character, which people will 'use' rather as they Artists' House in Jerusalem in 1971, he created of an artist, born to East European parents,
use a forest. As Orion sees it, the dimensions a group of objects built from boards and cloth. who grew up and lives in the country and is
of the area and of the structures in it cannot be The board hung on the wall formed the stable, trying to create relationships in various
conceived on the scale which in a city exists permanent element while the cloth stretched directions. Another type of identification, one
between man and, say, a building. They are on a towards the room was the unstable, flexible, of discovery, is found in the work of three young
monumental scale, one likely to exist between transitory element. The combination, which artists who recently immigrated to Israel :
man and endless space. The monolithic form was intended to change the simple relation of Georgette Bathe (b. 1942) chooses characteristic
of the structures and their distribution in the the two-dimensional wall to the space, sites in the landscape and defines the actual act
area have a concrete function, not a simple simultaneously unified the two visual and of choosing : she ties trees to one another in a
aesthetic one. It is interesting to note that physical aspects of the materials into a single grove near Jerusalem, or rocks on the seashore;
Hadany and Orion studied in London, where unit in which there is no distinction between she is conscious of strong winds and sets up
they created sculptures in a totally different conceptual and psychological factors. Elsewhere poles hung with sails which no longer have any

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