A Station in Time 2020

Exhibition of the First Studio Graduates for 2019-20 at The Small Gallery: Chen Sivan, Shira Barkani, Tair Almor

Curator: Ravit lazer

Opening: Thursday, 03.09.20, 19:00

Closing: Tuesday, 22.12.20, 19:00

The First Studio Scholarship is an adventure that touches on humanity and materiality. The year program invites the winners to improve their knowledge and skills of the ceramic medium as well as what is involved in running a studio.  The contact with teachers and artists that are leaders in their field in Israel as well as from abroad, exposes the participants to many approaches in making and thinking.  During the year, besides working in the studio, the participants are encouraged to progress with their own work, for some a direct continuation of their final projects and for others, ideas develop into a new body of work.

Chen Sivan, a graduate of the Department of Ceramic and Glass Design, Bezalel, searches for her personal, intimate path with clay, touching on ancient and new traditions, exact definitions if possible, as a creator/potter/maker in clay.  During this complex year, after leaving the academy with a pandemic in the background, in an environment of supportive and accepting women, Chen created wheel thrown vessels to be used and allowed herself to accept that she is a potter, a maker of harmonious objects, glorifying the softness of the clay on the wheel, accentuated with the glazes.

Shira Barkani, a graduate of the Industrial Design Department, Shenkar, gathers memories, fleeting moments, landscapes, and places into a visual archive that is the raw material for her works. Based on her design practices developed in her studies she added to her knowledge about materials which allowed her to use traditional materials and techniques in different combinations forming a new body of work. The objects, images and colors of the sulphates relate a poetic motif of time through changes in the sky and water, the transparent shine of blue recall sunrise and sunset as well as a changing landscape.

Tair Almor, a graduate of the Industrial Design Department, Shenkar, examines her place as an industrial designer specializing in clay during her year at the Benyamini Center, selecting the use of deconstruction and distortion as a means of creating a series clay cups.  Tair embarks on her journey through an in-depth examination of the generic and typical cup.  She defines the details, qualities and organs and composes the cup after distorting each element individually creating a new object that conserves the memory of the original cup.  She chose to take this to extreme using a material that “simulates” the memory of different clays.

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