In our next show (which opens on Saturday, December 6) we will host the exhibition “with you” – a mutual show by the artists Tama Goren & Dani Back. Throughout this past year, artists Tama Goren and Dani Back have come together to collaborate on a series of joint works. They share the same format and territory, creating something new through a mutual experiment. The exhibition “With you” displays the conjoint works of the two artists alongside their personal works.
Back works systematically, carefully planning out his layered pieces. Goren draws impulsively, extracting the characters without sketches; emotion is dominant. The two artists’ approaches are completely at odds. The collaborative process, wasn’t defined in an organized way, but rather was fashioned from the work they created together. The process is repetitive: one starts, the other joins or they switch; the emphasis is on adding up and subtraction. A layer is added onto another layer in industrial acrylic, carbon, graphite, enamel, and ink colors carved into wood until the final result is achieved. The works are large format, which on the one hand allow broad freedom of expression and on the other, creates a larger commitment to the composition and to making a bold statement.
These differences between Goren and Back’s forms demand a new conceptualization of the term “process” and of the way they each work and create. Like a romantic relationship, working together on a joint format requires sacrifices, discussion and openness. In their work process, the artists investigate their individual place in a relationship, the ability to make space for the other and the difficulty in creating this space.
“There is a painful sacrifice for the benefit of something new, the process is complicated, you have to know where to place your weight and where to give room for the other, to understand where you find expression on the common board and in what way”, says Back. “You have to let the other in to your most intimate place” adds Goren, “to the place of your art and your creation, so
that together you can accomplish a joint work in a positive way.
The works portray the partnership, depicting the pain, the fears, the mutual progression; you need a great ability to contain the other during the process.” The collaborative works that are presented in the exhibition paint a fascinating personal portrait of a dual art connection, true and uncompromising, and present a conceptual and perceptual challenge to its viewer.
(Text by Elinor Lechtman)