Kibbutz is Sometimes a Home, Sometimes an Address

1.3.25 – 22.3.25

New Exhibition at Givat Haviva Art Gallery

Exhibition Curator: Atar Geva | Gallery Curator: Anat Lidor

The fourth exhibition in the "Derech Eretz" (Way of the Land) series approaches the Kibbutz with questions: How does one continue to create in a home where many of its residents are no longer present? How did the Kibbutz become an address to which its lovers and critics always return? When is it an address and when is it a home? An exhibition that turns its gaze towards the Negev.

Dov Heller  harnessed his art for his Kibbutz, Nir Oz, for the plow, for agriculture, for the holidays in their Kibbutz version, and for the food production processes that were dear to his heart. His works, which emerged from the cowshed into the city and spread their wings to reach exhibition spaces, tell the story of the artist who developed facing the fields on one hand and the fences of Gaza on the other. Heller made sure to speak with the audience and laid out his political views and originality in a way that was accessible to viewers, and the viewers listened. Together with Haim Maor and other artists, he founded the group "HaMeshutaf Kibbutz" (The Kibbutz Collective) in the 70s – a first-of-its-kind political organization of artists who addressed issues that were then fragmenting Israeli society and continue to do so today.

Haim Maor returns to a work he created in 1979, titled "Melting Myths," and walks anew through the ideological paths of the Kibbutz. His critique of the Kibbutz movement’s difficulty in holding onto its ideology in the face of the winds of capitalism and human nature meets the Kibbutz anew after October 7th, which dealt a fatal blow to entire communities.

It is precisely in these somber days that the art that once bit now comes to console.

Aviv Atsili   created in between – in the cracks between his work as the garage manager and the bosom of his family – and spared no raw materials, which he saw everywhere: crumbling pieces of metal, old equipment, household items that had lost their usefulness. As a technician who fixed heavy agricultural tools, Atsili managed to see the pains beyond the physical malfunction, and when he chose to paint, he incorporated that same observation into his works.

Galya Heller, Dov's daughter and a close friend of Aviv Atsili, recounts: "He and my father had a shared love for tools. My father loved a hammer more than painting. Aviv also loved tools and was enthusiastic about them. I gave him the ones that belonged to my father. He was so happy."

Also presented in this exhibition is Tamar Nissim's video work – 'Whose Grief is This Anyway?' – which features Kibbutz members who returned to their homes after many months of living as refugees after their communities were captured or evacuated in past wars, and had to cope with personal bereavement against the collective grief of the Kibbutz community.

The exhibition closes on 22.3.25, marking the final chord in the "Derech Eretz" 

exhibition series at the Givat Haviva Gallery.

Currator text

For the Virtual Tour here

Opening to the Public: 1.3.2025

Venue: Givat Haviva Art Gallery

Closing Event: 'HaHitkabtzu' (The Gathering) – Art, Discourse, and Performance – 22.3, 10:00-13:00