Black tray

First solo exhibition by Aisha Arar in painting, drawing, video, performance, and visual texts.

Aisha — a young, talented Arab artist and graduate of the Midrasha School of Art from Jaljulia — presents her first solo exhibition in Israel.

The exhibition explores the spaces between the feminine and the masculine poles; between the extremes in which Aisha lives as a woman, a religious person, and an artist in Arab society in Israel, and those that exist within every woman: the powerless, confined, and submissive place that often suffers violence and, in its most extreme state, may lead to killing; and the free, wild, empowered feminine state that can — and is permitted to — ask what true love is, enjoying full freedom of choice and expression, without fear.

Both of these states appear in Palestinian folk tales passed down orally from generation to generation by women.

Aisha brings these tales to the forefront as they emerge in the exhibition through a personal artistic translation, in a series of collaborative video works — works created in partnership with different groups of women, at times through dance (the Nua Dance Company) and at times through music (musicians from the Nova music group).

How — and whether — opposing poles can live side by side is a central question.

The exhibition experience moves between the world of tales and fantasy, creation and life, and the world of reality — power relations, control, violence, and destruction — in a sharp, free, and untamed gaze.