Sigalit Landau

14.2.21–17.4.21

The exhibition by Sigalit Landau and Yotam From at Givat Haviva addresses tension, encounter, and the Jewish–Arab, Western–Eastern, masculine–feminine possibility, through works deeply rooted in this land.

It seems that Landau’s work has rarely been defined first and foremost as political—and largely justifiably so: it powerfully activates primal sensations and emotions; it is art at its finest. Yet ultimately, it is also highly political.

This may stem from the fact that in every work, exhibition, or site she creates, Landau constructs a world—a total thematic framework combining intense emotional experience, precise aesthetics, references to layers, periods, and works in art history, personal and human associations resonating on the same string, and Israeli connotations that have remarkably crossed the sea to reach broad audiences beyond this country.

From early in her career, her art profoundly shook the foundations of the art world—with its persistent rationalism, dominant male authority, and deep fear of spirituality in art. That fear, after twenty-five years, is finally beginning to crack and destabilize within the central structures of the art world. Sigalit Landau has played a role in this. She brought a new, penetrating spirit—fearless; an exposed art, at times down to the marrow, both small and large in every sense. Landau never paused to confront these forces directly, but rather surged forward in her own cycles—circles that recur throughout her work in their primal, cyclical, meditative, and complete form.

As an artist who has exhibited in leading venues  , what can modest Givat Haviva offer her?

Perhaps an encounter between her art and a living idea—a space where people and cultures meet, live, learn, and create together, with all the complexity this entails. Perhaps also a gaze that gathers an axis of encounter between: kibbutz / Negev / Jerusalem / Ashkenazi / agricultural—and Arab / Gazan / Jordanian / laboring / productive.

Thus, works from different periods—rarely shown together before—are woven into the space, forming points of encounter between the Western Jewish-European and the Eastern Arab–Middle Eastern.

Givat Haviva is open to all audiences, yet is largely composed of kibbutz members and Arab citizens from the Wadi Ara region. Their roots are grounded in pioneering Eastern European Zionist Judaism and in deeply rooted local Arab identity—two populations carrying memories of displacement and migration in their hearts.

In the intimate work “Death of the Swan,” scents of the Eastern street and memories of European jewelry are sculpted like a music box playing Saint-Saëns’ The Dying Swan. Here, Givat Haviva meets one of its subtle, often unspoken points of encounter and difference: two cultural poles connected by a shared moral and human vision, which today perhaps more than ever seeks a lifeline in our society.

The encounter between Givat Haviva’s vision and Landau’s work raises questions not always openly discussed. For example: does the idea of building a floating bridge between Israel and Jordan across the Dead Sea—a project Landau envisioned as a realizable possibility—resonate with the residents of Wadi Ara, and more broadly with Arab citizens of Israel?

Similarly, where do the recent peace agreements with Dubai, Bahrain, and Morocco intersect with the experiences of Arab citizens of Israel?

How will the exhibition’s interior space—where nudity is a natural and present element—be received by audiences from Wadi Ara, including women and men, religious and secular, older and younger generations?

In the simple, intimate video “Hula Till,” Landau spins a hula hoop made of barbed wire around her abdomen, piercing and wounding her body with every rotation. While the body is injured in a circular motion combining play and pain, the background opens onto the vast and infinite sea and horizon.

DeadSee is a complex and costly video work, rare in scale within her oeuvre. Here too, she is fully present—thin, nude, part of a chain of watermelons that eventually bleed. Beauty and pain are experienced simultaneously in a sharp line that first addresses the body, bypassing the rational mind that seeks to interpret. In the same way, her meditative exposure alternates between openness and a stark, unsettling nakedness.

Another axis present in the space is the masculine–feminine. The feminine appears as Landau’s own body; as the absent body of Leah in her black dress, referencing the lineage of actresses who played her in The Dybbuk, including Hanna Rovina and others; as the absent bride in a salt-bleached dress; and as the three women carving the vanishing ground between waves and shore in “Salted Brides,” at the border between the infinite sea and the land between Ashkelon and Gaza.

These stand opposite the masculine body, represented through the movements of laborers harvesting olives in Kibbutz Revivim in the Negev; in garments being washed and wrung in “Window”; in a man preparing knafeh; and in boys playing territorial knife games in the sand in the video work “Azkelon.”

In the video “Hands,” the digging hands—one male, one female—move toward each other without seeing, yet with direction and intent. Here, gender, political, and social encounters converge against a backdrop of voices from political figures, including Yasser Arafat, Benjamin Netanyahu, Ehud Olmert, Ahmad Tibi, Bill Clinton, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin, and Barack Obama. Ultimately, a space emerges where colors can blend without being erased.

She is not alone: behind “Sigalit Landau” stands an entire team—a collective of labor, production, and creation. Landau is прежде всего a working artist, as is her team. Yotam From, her partner and an exceptional photographer, accompanies her in everything. The exhibition—and especially the photographic works—are a joint creation.

Sigalit Landau’s art is mesmerizing—its hypnosis both beautiful and painful; a hypnosis of uncompromising art that insists on possibility within reality. Within this possibility—even, and especially, in a country marked by vast cultural diversity—hegemony and identity conflicts may give way to a real door that opens. Here, at Givat Haviva, this is already happening.

Exhibition catalogue

Virtual tour here

 

Exhibition Events

Gallery talk with Sigalit Landau, Yotam From, and Gideon Ofrat: 10.4.21
Exhibition closing: 17.4.21

Exhibition page in Hebrew | Exhibition page in Arabic