Lines

Wheelchairs, 2006-2007; X-ray photos, 2007; Kites, 2007

Dalia Meiris’ new exhibition is an outcome of the death of her mother in the fall of 2005, after long months of being bound to a wheelchair and assisted by a nurse for all of her daily needs. The exhibition is constructed of three groups of work all dealing with the interior and exterior of the human body and its’ certain destruction.
“Wheelchairs” present a disordered construction railings attached to wheelchairs. Mess of curved lines, entwined into each other, yet still protruding out. Inside this chaos, figures are hidden. The chairs – old, broken and missing parts, were collected from retirement homes, the “Yad Sarah” association, establishments for the handicapped and private donors. On the chairs she welded a thicket of construction railings as drawings of lines in space, growing from the chair and outlining figures yearning to move – to break through their handicap. The characters – some are filled with life as their movements are open to the air; others are folded, distorted in their despair. A few of the chairs became the dwelling of couples, in which the disabled is stronger than the healthy one – supporting him and comforting him.
“X-Ray Drawings” present a thicket of lines is drawn on a mirror like surface. The spectator’s image is reflected inside this chaotic complexity. A human figure is hidden in the forest of lines – faces and body limbs. The skeleton is interwoven in its own body – the skull mixed with the face, inside and out. The appearance of the living is mixed with its own erosion of death. After the death of her mother, piles of X-Ray photos were left as traces of her sickness. These dark sheets left her the memory of her mother’s suffering body like an album of her life, and she started drawing her own memories on these photos. After a while she found herself referring to the photos as her own, as her own body, as her own skeleton. She draws herself inside and out. Her living body hides its own extinction. She draws on a mirror-like surface which is attached to the X-Ray sheet, so she can use the dual information of my reflection. “Kites” is a group of Light sculptures, house-like, made up of Bamboo and processed X-ray and C.T. photos. The “kites” hang from the ceiling, at a height which allows the observer to step inside. The structures are dark and dimmed to the outside. In entering them, the observer’s image is reflected in mirror-like walls. The upper surfaces, the roofs, are covered with images of skeletal pieces and internal organs. Her use of X-ray photos allows a glimpse into the body combined with fears of erosion, fatigue and sickness.
Meiri: “At a museum in Mexico, I saw a Toltek mask composed of three faces, one inside the other. The outer face was of a skull. Inside it was a wrinkled old man. In the center of the mask was a young man whose face was framed by his future – maturation, aging, death.”

* Performance by the artist will be held on openning day at 12:30