The Tel Aviv Museum of Art Features A Major Exhibition of Works by Anselm Kiefer

Written by Stanley Rubinstein Friday, 16 December 2011 21:07

Tel Aviv.- The Tel Aviv Museum of Art inaugurated the new Herta and Paul Amir building by hosting an exhibition of work by Anselm Kiefer, "Shevirat Ha-Kelim (Breaking of the Vessels)". Specially conceived by Anselm Kiefer for the dramatic new museum space, the exhibition is on view until April 15th 2012. An extraordinary selection of Anselm Kiefer’s monumental paintings, sculptures, woodcuts and installations on themes of Jewish history and mysticism, chosen predominantly from the artist’s own collection, will be presented in this exhibition.

The new building’s dramatic 9,000-square-foot special exhibition gallery will feature five new sculptures from the artist’s 'Les femmes d'Antiquité (Women of Antiquity)' series, five new monumental, mixed-media paintings, three more recent paintings from Kiefer’s own collection, and another two from private collections, three large new woodcuts, each measuring approximately 2 x 3 meters, a version of the large-scale installation 'West-Eastern Divan', and a new installation, 'Shevirat Ha-Kelim (Breaking of the Vessels)', to be specially created by the artist on site.


A landmark addition to the main complex of the  Tel Aviv Museum of Art — the leading museum of modern and contemporary art in Israel — the Amir Building designed by Preston Scott Cohen, provides large, well-proportioned galleries for temporary exhibitions and works from the permanent collection (principally Israeli art, architecture and design, prints and drawings, and photography) within a spectacular, continually unfolding public space. "Breaking of the Vessels" has been organized by the late Professor Mordechai Omer, Director and Chief Curator, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, in collaboration with the artist. Among the subjects addressed in the works in Shevirat Ha-Kelim (Breaking of the Vessels)  are the stories of biblical figures such as Cain and Abel, Noah and Samson; the Kabbalistic ideas of the “tree of Sephirot” (or emanations of God) and the shattering of a formerly unified world (shevirat ha-kelim, or Breaking of the Vessels); Isaac Abravanel, the 15th-century Biblical scholar and statesman who was forced from Spain in the expulsion of 1492; and Paul Celan, the Romanian-born, German-language Jewish poet who survived the Holocaust and was one of the first in the post-war era to write about these experiences.

Anselm Kiefer was born in 1945 in Donaueschingen in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. From 1993, he lived and worked near the Cevennes (Gard) in Barjac, France; since 2007 he is based in Paris. After studying law, and Romance languages and literature, he devoted himself entirely to painting. He attended the School of Fine Arts at Freiburg in the Breisgau district and the Art Academy (Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste) in Karlsruhe (under Profs. Peter Dreher and Horst Antes), while maintaining contact with Joseph Beuys. His work has been shown in and collected by major museums throughout the world. Recent major exhibitions include a retrospective at the Modern Art Museum, Fort Worth (2005), traveling to the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C., and SF MOMA; an extensive survey of recent work at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (2007); and the commission to create a huge, site-specific installation of sculptures and paintings for the inaugural Monumenta at the Grand Palais, Paris (2007). Also in 2007, Kiefer became the first living artist since Georges Braque (in 1953) to have a permanent installation at the Louvre. In 2009, he directed and designed the sets for Am Anfang (In the Beginning) at the Opéra National in Paris. Kiefer’s connection with Jewish heritage and Israel was recognized in 1990 when he was awarded the prestigious Wolf Foundation Prize in the Arts. He used the entirety of the $100,000 prize money to establish the Ingeborg Bachmann Scholarship for young Israeli artists.


The Tel Aviv Museum of Art is Israel’s leading museum of modern and contemporary art, and home to one of the world’s largest collections of Israeli art. Since its founding in 1932, the Museum has served as one of Tel Aviv’s major cultural hubs, displaying a vibrant mix of permanent collections and temporary exhibitions in a wide variety of fields – painting, sculpture, prints and drawings, photography, video, architecture and design. Situated in an impressive architectural complex, the Museum is an integral part of the city’s major cultural center – the Golda Meir Cultural and Art Center – home to the Israeli Opera and the Cameri Theater. One of the most diverse and dynamic cultural institutions in Israel, the Tel Aviv Museum of Art serves as a hub of activity for the local arts scene. In addition to its collections, the Museum presents performances of music and dance, film, and lecture series on philosophy and art. The fully computerized art library and its Documentation Center for Art in Israel serve over 15,000 students, scholars and curators each year.

The library subscribes to the major art journals and receives the latest catalogues of exhibitions of Israeli art, modern and contemporary art, photography, design and architecture. It is the most comprehensive reference center in the Middle East. The Museum’s original building on Rothschild Boulevard has great historical significance: it was there that Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion proclaimed the establishment of the State of Israel on 14 May 1948. The Helena Rubinstein Pavilion for Contemporary Art, an adjunct to the main building, functions as a showcase and platform for young talents. Opened in 1959, it was beautifully renovated in 1989 with funds provided by the Helena Rubinstein Foundation and the Municipality of Tel Aviv-Yafo. The Danek and Jadzia Gertner Gallery specializes in changing long-term exhibitions of decorative art. Each week some 1,500 children, youth and adults from all walks of life attend classes in painting, drawing, ceramics, sculpture, photography, video and computer art, and printmaking at the Museum's Joseph and Rebecca Meyerhoff Art Education Center. Visit the museum's website at ... http://www.tamuseum.com

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