Can Art Magazine - Gallery - Ophira Spitz at Janco-Dada Museum, Ein Hod

Ophira Spitz at Janco-Dada Museum, Ein Hod

Artist Ophira Spitz has created her exhibition “Fracture” against the backdrop of the Israeli reality on the verge of crisis, shedding light on political and social upheaval while offering a global ecological perspective. The exhibition takes the form of a triptych installation that seeks to connect symbolic images to external and internal events.
Using images influenced by nature, the environment and the topography, Spitz merges and integrates unraveled edges using material connections comprising free and amorphous shapes, created with methods ranging from hand crafting to automatic operations. One part of the triptych contains two blue balls unequal in size. They are made of torn strips of dense and rolled up tulle fabric using a delicate method of meditative finger crocheting that incorporates internalization and concealment. Next to these balls is a shabby and unstable street bench that is held together and tied to the ceiling by thin white threads, echoing the schism and rupture in the public sphere. The second part of the triptych depicts a geological upheaval: an earthquake in which branches, stones, and rocks are suspended and flung throughout the space. These objects are wrapped in roadmaps, navigation signs, and misshapen atlases that have lost their value—a reminder of the collapse of the social systems in Israel. The third part, which is positioned on a wall adjacent to the stairs, contains a large hanging assemblage composed of pieces of stained cloth, a reminder of rusted everyday metallic objects marked by the ravages of time. Among these objects, the artist has embroidered a string of X’s with blue thread as a gesture to the “human fabric” and a means of tying the past to the present.
According to the artist’s interpretation, these installations are designed to remind us of the extent to which we as human beings are in need of human contact, empathy, and collective action in order to cope with distressful situations. Indeed, the psychological and emotional impact of natural disasters and other crises on human society is liable to lead to social collapse, yet can also serve as an opportunity for change and for seeking new means of navigating reality. She states: “This is a powerful reminder of the ways in which we are all connected to one another and of the major impact that natural disasters and other crises can have on our lives and our communities”.
Today the democratic nature of Israel is hanging in the balance, and divisiveness is tearing apart the heart of the Israeli public and undermining its lifeblood and its stability as a just society. Thoughts about current events also disrupt the work of the artist in the studio, in this exhibition finding expression in a fraction line and a reflection of the inevitable connection between mankind and the power of nature. Hence the artist calls our attention to a way to improve the face of Israeli society on the globe on which we live. The blue and white flags that are currently painting the public spaces and roads in the country become even more meaningful on the artistic stage as an expression of the tension between destruction and disruption on the one hand and growth and renewal on the other.

Curator: Avital Katz Read more

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