Page 38 - Art-in-Israel

ISLAND OF FLOWERS SHALOM AL ISRAEL 2002 LADDER OF MOTIVES 1994
HEIGHT CM. 250 /IN. 100, CM. 250X180X25 /IN. 100X72X1 HEIGHT CM. 600 /IN. 236, PAINTED
SCULPTURE RABIN CENTER FOR JEWISH ALUMINIUM
ALONG BEGIN AVENUE, HERZELYA STUDIES, PAINTED STEEL, OPEN MUSEUM TEFEN, UPPER GALILEE
HEBREW UNIVERSITY JERUSALEM

WORKS IN PUBLIC SPACE Waddy Nisnass to Maale Adumim, and from Haifa to Jerusalem. At
some of these spots, there are multiple units, vivid in their artificial
colors and entirely unrealistic. This may be only a beginning. Soon
David Gerstein has changed the spirit of environmental sculpture in Israel. the public and the entrepreneurs may be enchanted and
No more the enigmatic object that arouses a feeling of splendor and entertained with new objects.
distance, but sculpture as an accessible object, fresh and optimistic like
the bicycle rider, an inviting object as if in a public garden or small The development of Gerstein’s public sculptures has paralleled the
playground. Gerstein’s sculptures compete with advertisements or transformation of Israel from a welfare society to a consumer
toothpaste smiles. They are objects that assume inside every viewer there society. This is a society that has adapted the logic of art to mass
is a child who has not yet freed himself from the need for toys and colorful culture, with its production methods, stereotypes, commercial
pictures of new or old and familiar objects. No longer are these the formal values, standardization, schematization, and repetition. With this
or severe statues born as a natural extension of Zionist ideology. style of mass culture, Gerstein aims to stimulate his audience to
the highest degree. These are people who don’t have all the time
The “weight” of Yehiel Shemi’s, Yigal Tomarkin’s or Dani Caravan’s statues in the world to wonder about the meaning of art. They drive on
is transformed with the lightest of touches into a summer’s sea breeze the roads, stressed, exposed to the wayside billboards with their
lifting a young girl’s skirt. The place of the politically and socially committed beckoning images. They shop until they drop in the malls, seduced
“masculine” artist is taken by the artist as “magician,” who pulls more and by endless sales and colorful posters. They walk quickly past a
more colorful dancing shapes out of his sleeve, to decorate public places, sculpture in the street, or stare briefly at a painting on a gallery
commercial centers, roads, and parks. wall. They are themselves like Gerstein’s images: large shapes
filled with schematic men and women in constant and never-
Gerstein sculptures can be found at more than 40 locations in public ending motion. His painted objects look as though they have just
spaces, from Maalot to Avdat, Raanana to Herzlya, Lod and Holon, from jumped out of a wall, in stubborn disregard of their environment

ART IN ISRAEL ART IN ISRAEL
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WORLD OF ART WORLD OF ART