YIFAT BEZALEL ⎸
SHIPLESS OCEANS
M ⎸ K PROJECTS, TEL AVIV, 2021
A joint exhibition of works by Yifat Bezalel and Daniel Tchetchik. The exhibition showcases the artists’ recent works in an intimate space where seemingly unrelated works paint a common poetic song. It is rare to show drawing and photography together. When Yifat Bezalel and Daniel Tchetchik decided to work on this exhibition, it felt completely natural, both aesthetically and narratively, almost essential, being both renowned artists in their own fields and hyper sensitive human beings. The idea came after a long period of creative introspection. Both artists delved into their past works and revisited their esthetic references in a new light or rather a new darkness.
The works presented, despite being strikingly different in technique, subject and style, convey a common feeling of sadness and eerie solitude. On closer look, however, more similarities become apparent. Bezalel explores the point of contact between life and death, between matter and spirit, between suffering and ecstasy through the iconography of Bernini’s excellent sculptures of Ludovica Albertoni and Saint Teresa in a state of transverberation, moments before their death. Bernini immortalised Ludovica Albertoni’s agonal breath lying on the precipice of her earthly life, her hand clutching her failing heart, her lips parted.
Yet, her features radiate a sort of transcendental euphoria, an overwhelming joy and ecstasy. Ludovica, after a lifetime devotion to Christian charity, is about to reunite with her Creator. Similarly, the Transverberation of Saint Teresa, another of Bezalel’s recurring Bernini references, touches on that point of contact between earth and heaven, that point of true solitude.
Tchetchik’s compositions deal with a similar line of contact or lack thereof: the dust road between the burnt and the spared forest, the distance between the shepherd’s dog and its herd, the window frame that separates us from the exterior, the gap between two eroded rocks. Both artists explore with their own words, the limits between two states of being, the rift that so often defines the irreconcilability between two people and the loneliness that ensues, as if loneliness were inevitable. Building upon his recent series commissioned by the International Red Cross entitled, “Dark Waters”, Tchetchik captures the scenes where unfathomable human tragedy took , and continues, to take place. As if documenting the scene of a crime after it happened, it still resonates with the victim’s screams. Nature’s beauty, however, takes over, unaware, almost indifferent. Reminiscent of Albert Camus’s “L’Etranger”, it is this distance which Tchetchik captures, the apathy we all experience when facing human tragedy, leaving us desperately lonely.
Both artists explore with their own words the limits between two states of being, the rift that so often defines the irreconcilability between two people, and the loneliness that ensues as if loneliness were inevitable.