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Jerusalem Report logo small (credit: JPOST STAFF)
Romanian-born Haviv Hauspeter is a self-taught artist, which in itself brings freshness and certain courageousness into his art. As a child, he would draw in pencil and discover the great artists of the past. This motivated him to take up art later in life. By profession, he is an accountant, a field of endeavor often thought to be the polar opposite of that of art. Yet embracing both aspects of self, Haviv straddles the boundaries between the conscious realm of analytical thought as well as the murky sub-conscious and free self-expression that characterize art and art-making.

He is adept at both painting and photography. In the case of the latter, his work is more figurative and literal as he explores with the camera – even a cell phone camera – the ephemeral and transient, capturing “snapshots” in the continuous steam and unfolding of life or as life manifests. Yet it is his paintings that are most intriguing.

Titles of his works, such as Restricted Freedom, Cheerful Gloom, Happy Tears and so on convey the sense of living in paradox, not necessarily a contradiction. That is to say, the human capacity to hold or bear opposites, to unite the seeming contrary within one and the same inchoate impression. One might term this a wise heart, insofar as extremes merge at the boundary so that deep sadness may also be heightened ecstasy, and depth of heart or tears might express profound joy and so on. But it is not in the titles and words that such sentiment is expressed: Haviv does so through subtle sensitivity to color, a stringy line that plays and swirls, fuses with other lines and then separates again.

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