Collective creativity: Jerusalem coming back to life

If we are to continue to create, and to enjoy the product thereof – surely a fundamental requisite of the human race – we need to address the grassroots.

By BARRY DAVIS
Updated: JUNE 3, 2021 16:59
THE INVITING 24-9 record and design outlet offers works by a broad slew of artists (photo credit: MAYA KEDEM)
THE INVITING 24-9 record and design outlet offers works by a broad slew of artists
(photo credit: MAYA KEDEM)
It warms the cockles, nay exhilarates, to see our cultural life return to ever more robust tracks. Seeing, for example, the Israel Festival take place, despite everything we have endured over the past year and a bit – not to mention more recent violent events – is hugely encouraging.
But, if we are to continue to create, and to enjoy the product thereof – surely a fundamental requisite of the human race – we need to address the grassroots.
Glittering showcase rollouts are all well and good, and appeal to the masses, but it is the lower register, the less media-heralded fare, that helps to nurture the fresh green shoots of nascent artistic endeavor.
Thus, I was delighted to recently make my way over to 9 Shlomo Hamelech St., up the road from Mamilla in the direction of the Old City, to catch a glimpse of Niv Gafni’s site-specific collection at the diminutive Gerem display space.
The compact arts complex, established last December by the Artists Collective, opens up as you enter through the timeworn iron door and encounter a veritable Shangri-la of diverse artistic offerings. And the ambiance and decor of the well-preserved Ottoman edifice ain’t half bad either. It was all a delightful revelation to eyes and senses starved of the fruits of creative pursuits for far too long.
In addition to Gerem, the ground floor of the building takes in the current home of the iconic Barbour Gallery, which spent several years ensconced in the heart of Nahlaot, and over which several running battles were waged prior to the relocation. There is also a yoga studio, a collective-based record (vinyl) and arts and crafts store, the offices of the Mazkeka performance venue, bar and recording studio which operate over on Shushan St., and even a cozy cinema with room for around 20 patrons, at a pinch.
This is clearly a quintessential Jerusalem enterprise with the miniscule movie theater going by the name of Rex, thus keeping alive the memory of one of the city’s fabled leisure spots, which closed down in 1947 following a politically motivated arson attack.
Gafni graduated in 2018, with honors, from the Department of New Music at the Musrara School of Art. His oeuvre spans visual art and experimental music, with his current showing dipping into both disciplines. He is also a member of the artists’ studio just down the road at number 7.
It was only natural that Gafni and his Artists Collective pals should start looking around their own neighborhood for a physical space where they could introduce the public to their creations.
“We are all relative newcomers to the world of art and we all studied at schools in Jerusalem,” he explains.
They had at least one eye on the site next door.
“We always thought it could be a good place where we could exhibit things so, when we began to prepare the complex, we thought it would be good to include this space,” he adds referencing Gerem.
The 30-year-old’s work is presented under the unassuming numerical title of Gerem 04, indicating that it is the fourth exhibition held there to date. He and his colleagues would like us to make a little effort to access the content.
“We do ask a little of the public, more than regular galleries,” he says, noting that it isn’t a particularly challenging process. “All you have to do is go to the Internet address (www.gerem.space) and you get a code, which you use to open the door,” Gafni explains. “Some people don’t want to bother with that, which is a pity.”
The man’s got a point, and that becomes abundantly clear as you step inside. Gafni’s layout is intriguing and thought-provoking. There is something of a primordial feel to the thematic spread, but with a touch or two of more contemporary climes.
The Artists Collective blurb says Gafni “creates pseudo-authentic sound installations and environments and combines various mediums in his works, including sound, electronics, programming, mechanics, wood, metal and ready-made. Most of his activity focuses on sound and movement, the relationship between them and the spiritual field between human and everything else.”
Judging by the Gerem display, that is spot-on. The largest item, for example, appears to be a pretty rough-and-ready affair, comprising a couple of pairs of crossed planks of wood, teepee-style, with a section of an old round telephone pole, cracks and other pockmarks and all, spanning them. A parallel, horizontal, plank has 30 or 40 metal strings – they look like piano strings – attached to it and they stretch down to another transverse beam. Where things get quirky and downright left-field inventive, is the inclusion of four small old-school electric fans distended from electric wiring wrapped around the round beam. Their blades spin intermittently and inconsistently, striking different metal strings at varying tempos, thereby complementing the corporeal structure with an improvisatory dissonant soundtrack.
It appears that Gafni is no stranger to the sonic arts, although not in the conventional sense.
“I am a musician too,” he notes. “I mostly play instruments I devise myself.”
There is a laissez-faire flow to the hefty creation. As the fan blades spring from the metal chords, they spin away and then flop back in an ungainly arc, never striking the same string in the same place, thus generating unfettered musical lines. Gafni recommends that viewers enter the room singly, to experience the visual and auditory offering in as pure and focused fashion as possible.
There is a historical and political undercurrent to the exhibit.
“I was interested by the sort of chaotic aspect, with the fans playing out as a sort of natural phenomenon,” says Gafni.
There is an ebb and flow dynamic to it all, as the creations seem to leapfrog across time, deep into our past yet bearing some message about our current state of affairs.
“The starting point of the exhibition is an imaginary history according to which the city of Jerusalem was built around the objects in the exhibition,” the artist explains. “The exhibition revolves around ideas about cultures being built alongside water sources, wars of land control and the tension between the practical and the spiritual.”
That is a pretty succinct précis of the lay of the political and human terrain in these here parts.
On the technical-historical musical front, in the modest pamphlet that goes with the exhibition, Gafni relates that aforesaid wood-string-fan concoction was inspired by the Aeolian harp, which gets its moniker from the Greek god of the wind, Aeolus, and was traditionally played by air currents vibrating the strings. The two millennia-old instrument enjoyed something of a comeback during the Renaissance and there are a few dotted around the globe today. Aficionados may be interested to know that Gafni’s mechanical mélange is tuned to the scale employed by American composer Kyle Gann for his score “Andromeda Memories.” Might be worth checking out.
JERUSALEM-BASED Uri Duvdevani’s Where There Is No Piano incorporated paintings, sound, video and sculpture. (Tomer Zmora)
JERUSALEM-BASED Uri Duvdevani’s Where There Is No Piano incorporated paintings, sound, video and sculpture. (Tomer Zmora)
After communing with whatever happens to be in the Gerem space when you get there – the shows alternate every month – you might want to pop into Barbour to peruse works on display that, if the exhibitions unfurled at the former Nahlaot site are anything to go by, should be engaging, inviting and variegated. When I was there I caught the “Where There Is No Piano” exhibition by Jerusalem-based interdisciplinary artist Uri Duvdevani, which incorporated paintings and drawings, sound, video, sculpture, video art and dance.
And should you feel in need of some physical tension release and could do with some more relaxed breathing, there is a yoga studio there too, while the bright and breezy 24-9 record and design outlet has much to offer in the way of LPs, across all kinds of musical genres, as well as some fetching artifacts that include some wacky ceramic creations, fun handmade posters, cheery-looking socks and even a quality alcoholic beverage brewed by Mazkeka honcho Mikael Berkowitsch.
THERE IS, however, a dark cloud hovering on the horizon.
“We moved here right in the middle of the pandemic mess, in between lockdowns, so we sort of slipped under the radar,” says Gafni. But, at least, they found themselves an aesthetically pleasing home base, even if it does open onto a very loud street with vehicles revving up as they negotiate the steep incline.
And it is not just traffic decibel levels Gafni and his colleagues have to worry about. The premises, including the next-door studio, are due to be turned into a suite hotel.
“Things are very fluid right now,” he says with more than a touch of understatement. “We have only been here for six months, but I have been with the studio next door for a year and a half now and, personally, I feel strongly attached to it. We built up a community here.”
THE 9 Shlomo Hamelech Street facility is currently home to the iconic Barbour art gallery. (Tomer Zmora)
THE 9 Shlomo Hamelech Street facility is currently home to the iconic Barbour art gallery. (Tomer Zmora)
The emotional wrench factor is not mitigated by the Gerem philosophy.
“We basically decided the works we show here would be site-specific, made for this place,” Gafni continues. “And we wanted to offer it as a platform for artists who are starting out or are in the early stages of their career. And we are all Jerusalem-based artists, and we all create our works for this very place.” That certainly conveys the local patriotism factor.
It would, to say the least, be a shame to see a bunch of such dedicated and creative artists lose their home, come January. Jerusalem should be proud of the envelope-pushing youngsters feeling their way into the world, and often producing works of refreshing vision infused with the frontier spirit of the young and restless. Perhaps the municipality can help out here?
For more information, look up Gerem on Instagram or Facebook.


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