The Dead are Here (2009)
The collection of art works by Izhar Patkin in Massachusetts
Museum of Contemporary Art treads the boundaries between illusion and reality.
He could show the beauty by drawings and make people to think that what they
see is real. Izhar Patking, the visual artist was born in Israel and was
working more than 30 years in his career. Latest of his works are influenced by
after the deaths of several loved and close people and they focused on love,
time, and loss. One of his art pieces in the museum, The Dead are Here is a roofless room about 22 feet tall whose
interior walls are draped with painted tulle from their upper edge nearly to
the floor 14 feet below. The theatricality of the space makes a
strong first impression. On the curtains, there is a painting of a garden of
birch trees in bright pink blossom during the spring and at the background
there is a graveyard. The delicate, glowing fabric falls in soft pleats, the images
painted upon them repeating, but resisting firm definition. The collection was
inspired by the work of the late Kashmiri-American poet Agha Shahid Ali, with
whom Patkin was a close collaborator. Ali was a finalist for the National Book
Award in poetry the year of his death. After his death Patkin decided to use
his poems and ‘bring them to life’ by painting them, so people would able to
see what Ali described in his poems. The way of how Patkin made rooms is to
give a better focus, as the viewer moves around the room and the blurriness and
shadows of the objects give the feeling that ghosts are present. The effect is
dreamlike, momentarily startling and shows some sort of magic.
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