שרה זילברשטיין, כמו אישה, כמו ציפור, 2006 - עותק
As Woman, As Bird
Sara Zilberstein
Curator: Levin Irit
21 Jul — 18 August, 2007
In her new cycle of works Sara Zilberstein presents female figures in motion, hovering in space. Movement guides the composition, simultaneously relying on the interrelations between the motion of the dots scattered in the background and the hovering figures. Each of the figures remains isolated, maintaining no contact with the others. The figures radiate beauty and vitality, but appear to be fragile and helpless – they have no feet, and their wings are not real. The figures are created by incorporation of primal, archetypal images (flower, bird, fish, fruit, woman), overflowing with their abundant symbolic meanings in various cultures. The artist deconstructs and re-crosses their formal and symbolic – existential, female, sexual – components, furnishing them with her own original interpretation. The images are delimited within square boxes and triptychs, reminiscent of Christian icons, an impression further enhanced by the use of gold. The dialogue with the female discourse takes place in the very choice of images as well as in their treatment. Both series evince a profound scrutiny of detail, and both confront us with the female aspect – mellowness, fertility, cyclicality, processes of transition and transformation. The works invite the viewer to an experiential discourse, which has biographical implications as well. They generate an intricate dialectic of beauty and pain, power with detachment. The beauty – the aesthetic dimension – brings to the surface latent emotional processes that make room for hope and rectification (tikkun). Irit Levin, Curato.