The Dome structure by Adam Rabinowitz. “This chaste dome structure projects an image that is futuristic or maybe tribal or anything else that the visitor can imagine it to be.

How many of you who read this magazine live in Herzliya or the nearby cities?  How many of you visit or even know about our local museum?

The Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art is situated in the center of the city, adjoining Yad Lebanim, on the same site as the Law Courts on Ben Gurion Street.  This jewel of an establishment is the home of a wonderful art gallery that presents four exhibitions annually of contemporary works by Israeli and international artists.

Each exhibition shows a different set of artistic works under a new title. These are not group shows. Each exhibition has a curator who chooses the title of the exhibition and the works of art. Video art and the digital media as well as paintings, photography, sculpture and architecture are all included.

Over the years I have been to many exhibitions – not all to my taste, but there has always been something of interest to see. There have been many grand installations, wonderful photos, interesting paintings and incredible video art, some enchanting, others boring, some lovely to look at but completely incomprehensible.

The exhibition that was on in early 2011 was particularly enjoyable. The main hall had three large installations in different geometrical shapes made up of thousands of electric adaptors – intricate and pretty but a little too technical for me. Shay Frisch Peri’s work raised the question of art against industrial production.

The rest of the museum housed an exhibition entitled “Body Gestures” which examined body language, and to which ten artists had contributed. There were two separate exhibitions of photos, one of paintings and several film and video installations of varying sizes and lengths. One of the most interesting was in a large dark room with two screens at right angles to each other, and with benches for visitors to sit on for the 20-minute presentation. With a background narrated in various languages from the testimonies taken for Claude Lanzmann’s film Shoah, the foreground showed the text being interpreted into sign language for the deaf. We saw a lady at work, sitting at a desk, standing behind a fence, or with very clever graphics, the platform of a railway station giving the effect of trains going to the camps – a very moving and meaningful work. Maybe this could be shown on Holocaust Day elsewhere.

The latest exhibition will be on until the end of December. Called “Second Strike”, it opened in October as part of Herzliya’s third Biennale. It features works by 16 artists using many different techniques, including an architectural installation, drawings superimposed on photos and a large white dome that could represent any number of structures - a tomb, a nuclear reactor or maybe a spaceship or igloo.

Christopher Buchel uses a videoclip filmed in Teheran that he found in Israel. It shows a parade of hundreds of Iranian soldiers marching and forming the shapes of a swastika, the letters US and a Magen David.  A very large installation by Michal Helfman looks like a stage set with flat figures covered in shiny silver cloth. Small mirrors amongst the figures enable visitors to see themselves as part of the sculpture.

The next exhibition will open on January 21, 2012 and will show new installations and videos including work by a young Spanish artist.

The museum also has an educational department which has workshops and courses for people of all ages. It is known as a leading center for video art.

The building itself has an interesting design, with different sized exhibition areas – some large areas that can be divided up and some just large enough to house a television screen.

I highly recommend a visit to our local gallery, the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art. It is open four mornings and two afternoons every week. The entry cost is nominal and parking is easy all around the area. Spare a little time to visit the grounds around the museum which are home to a permanent exhibition of large sculptures by many well known artists. 

You will find the museum at 4 Ha’banim Street, Herzliya 46379. Tel:  09 955 1011; email info@herzliyamuseum.co.il, www.herzliyamuseum.co.il

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Barbara Lyons

Born in the UK in 1939, Barbara Lyons studied surveying. From 1971 she worked with the 35’s – Women’s Campaign for Soviet Jewry. She came to live in Israel in 1981 and worked in a...
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