tel aviv
“The artist feels not what he sees, but what he can not see”
Painting by Avraham Ofek
Saturday morning. Tel Aviv Museum of Art. "Body, Work" an exhibition of Avraham Ofek's work. His last body of work - left me speechless. Despite the impossibility to capture its feel through the reflections in the glass, I still photographed them. Raw feelings in pencil, watercolor and gouache. Here is how the curator introduced this body of work:
"Do you see what I see"
“Youth is happy because it has the capacity to see beauty. Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.”
The chorus line, Tel Aviv style
"Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old". I love this quote. There is so much beauty around us, in the most unexpected places. Above the electricity lines, next to the garbage bin. In the monochromatic fashion designer studio as well as the overcrowded balcony next to the central bus station. A taste of Tel Aviv.
Life is beautiful.
Jewelry made of paper
The designer studio - a new twist on B&W
Balcony in one of the most neglected areas of Tel Aviv.
“Tel Aviv is buzzing with so much life, you could bottle it and sell it as honey.”
No idea how it happened, but since the first time I saw graffiti art - I fell in love with it. it's filled with life, emotion, a truth that does not hide beneath layers of respectability, should's and politically correct statements. It's loud, kicking, vibrant, eclectic, surprising. No better place for it than the center of Israel's liofe - Tel Aviv. A city filled with a hodgepodge of architecture from Bauhaus to Modern skyscrapers, the home of millionaires and refugees, high end stores and traditional markets, Tel Aviv is an endless source of surprises. Last week, we went to see Kiryat HaMelacha, a neighborhood that used to house lots of small businesses and during the last years slowly changed into a thriving artist community, the forefront of the local contemporary art. Here is a taste of the local graffiti art that cover the industrial buildings that house more than 200 artist studios filled with all imaginable kinds of art.
Not a place for people looking for clean, immaculate streets, but what a treat for art lovers!
“I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m on my way.”
I may not know where I'm going, but I'm on my way....so true. 2 nights, photographing a surreal show, in a surreal place. Something there speaks to me. Makes me work with the images again and again. Try to find what is this place telling me.
The complex layers of life in a place doomed to be destroyed. Beauty found in the most unexpected places. The beauty of decay rather than the beauty of serene beaches. Beauty of art when it penetrates life rather then decorating it.
A shadow of its former self - by Amy Kanka Valadarsky
The audience - by Amy Kanka Valadarsky
“In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.”
I will confess I never read Dante's 'Divine Comedy'. I heard about it. Just like I never went to Tel Aviv's Central bus station, just read about the controversial mammoth station, mostly deserted, a symbol of the problematic south Tel Aviv area. As far away from a theater stage as hell is to heaven.
And this is precisely why, this garish place, full of winding corridors, tiny doors leading to nowhere and dark secrets was the perfect stage for Seven - the Mystorin theater's interpretation of mystical texts through movement and dance.
And the camera does its magic again. Photographing the actors in this place makes me realize how locked I still am in photographing nice things in a nice way. While this will always be a facet of me, what else will I discover once I will allow myself to shout?
Looking for a quote as an opening to this post, I found Dante's one:
In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost.
Well, maybe in the middle of MY life, I am coming to myself withing the dark corridors of Tel Aviv Central bus station ....
Mystorin - mystery - an appropriate name for the theater company who created Seven
The kitchen from hell
The opposite of theater stage - Central bus station, Tel Aviv