Back in Haifa for already a few months, back to my old routine of going to protests when I can (can't right now; forbidden out of safety concerns) and for the rest in the studio. As nothing much has changed, and we are still in the midst of the most wicked nightmare, I can only add my voice to the diminishing choir that sings stop-this-madness, and then turn to art making by default.
I make art because it is my way of speaking to the world about that which cannot be spoken about.
All around here people in the art world were trying to make art and show art about the "situation". We have a "situation" for as long as I can remember. So many lives lost and for what? The same people you hate today and wish them dead, can be your best friends tomorrow.
I say that art isn't about making comments on everyday life. That's for the columnists in the papers.
I go back to what I care about - color, space, forms, relationships, the story, the level of involvement, of fascination and awe, then painting over and over again until I am happy.
The first works are still about New York and vicinity:
I take walks, climb stairs (many!), peep into private back yards and discover that nature is not that far away. In the years I;ve been living here, trees have grown, small turned into big, shrubbery bacame tiny forest, and when I walk into the wadi's, dry riverbeds (they get wet in winter), I find with a spark of imagination I can feel like it's a real forest.