EMPTY SHELLS

BY5 Gallery, Tel-Aviv, Israel.
Curator: Nir Harmat,   March - April 2018

Extract from printed catalogue:

“Yonat Chameides’ subjects are soaked with history, memory and cultural heritage……... The pieces are of liquid turned solid, they are monochromatic and lightweight. They resemble an outer shell or a vessel of a presence that was, and is no more and yet its impression still lingers…

These empty figures, which are small in stature hint at allegories and symbolism, something reminiscent of forgotten secret, quiet rituals. Some of the pieces were influenced by ancient Egyptian mythology, and its belief in the separation of body and soul. The black metallic color is the color of shadows, of a missing presence and so they become a ghost of themselves - elusive, dim and dark.”

Reference to the exhibition in “1280” Magazine (By the editor, Talia Tokatly):

“A frontal collision between fabric and liquid ceramic substance becomes a self-sustaining construct that transcends the ceramic process.

The organic substance, the fabric, disintegrates with the rising temperature in the kiln and disappears from the eye of the beholder in the artworks exhibited in “Empty shells”.

One can think of the connection between the loss of certain substances in the ceramic work process, and the moment of death, where the organic matter comes apart and disappears from the body.”