Assaf Rahat’s solo exhibition contains works created in a unique technique which combines sewing threads and plastic glue next to small paper works, created in ink and water colors, form the years 2001-2007.
This exhibition deals with the private space, the mental space and the relations between the two. The exhibition includes an intimate description of images from memory and introspects, such as domestic objects, faces, intimate scenes, sexuality and death.
In all the works the white color acts simultaneously as an isolator and a host. On one side, the images all share a sense of complete isolation from any binding surroundings; thus the white color acts as an undefined space on which the images present themselves. Unlike a concrete habitat, the whiteness of the paper or the thread, open and unbound, does not protect the images from the inspectors’ gaze. At the same time the white color allows the images to be bright, fierce and alluring, as the paper absorbs the colors and contains the image.
The thread creates a web-like container with round objects inside, which can, in turn, become containers. The hard materials- concrete, metal, ceramics and calcium are replaced with delicate, soft, flexible, airy sewing threads.
The relations between isolation and containing, between soft and hard, feminine and masculine, amusing and threatening, express the meeting point of the domestic space and the mental space – a point where the well defined and concrete melts into the mental, into a space where many images float chaotically and without hierarchy.
This is the third solo show of Assaf Rahat at the Chelouche gallery. Rahat, born 1970, is a graduate of the Midrasha School of Art in Beit Berl (1994-1998). Rahat participated in group shows such as “About Rafi” in Nufar gallery (1999), “Arie Aroch- Erection in the Israeli Art” in Pe’er gallery (2000) and in the artists’ studios in Tel Aviv (2001), as well as created wall piece for the Yanko-Dada museum in Ein- Hod (2003). Rahat will participate in the exhibition “BoysCraft” opening in November 2007 at the Hifa Museum.
