THE LAB Catalogue 2024_minicatalog_SINGL by Elad Argaman

The Lab:

A Catalyst for Artistic Innovation and Curatorial Evolution

The Lab, a non-profit experimental art space, has evolved over the past years into a distinctive hybrid model, blending characteristics of an artist-run space with those of a curator-run space. This platform is an experimental reactor, fostering artistic theoretical and visual research and exploring intricate relationships within the art ecosystem. Bridging the curator-artist-space dynamics and examining the interconnectedness of artwork-audience-artist and space-curator, The Lab challenges conventions and norms in artistic display, emphasizing freedom of creation and committed research grounded in profound truths.

Each year, a professional jury selects ten artists with whom I exchange mutual research, guiding them through every stage of the curatorial process. Initially conceived as a space for local art exploration, the Lab has organically given rise to diverse communities within the art world, encompassing artists, curators, collectors, gallerists, and non-commercial art enthusiasts. The dynamic between artists and myself introduces a compelling dimension, where some adhere to conventional thinking, while others break free from established norms to varying degrees of success.

An interesting shift in the curator-artist relationship has emerged over time, transforming the traditional curatorial process structure. Rather than leading the process, I now act as a thinking engine or gate opener, fostering a balanced creative energy with the artists. Curating this way demands a release of curatorial power to attain a balanced creative energy of both sides.

Historically, two experimental ways of curating has influenced the creative curating process in The Lab.

The first has taken place at the breakthrough exhibition "Live in Your Head: When Attitudes Become Forms", curated by Harald Szeemann in 1969 at the Kunsthalle Bern Museum. This show represented a significant change in display modes, by presenting the notion of site-specific artwork, which has since been acclaimed as the innovation of the art world. Szeemann, with his unique perspective, broadened the conventional responsibilities of the curator, going beyond the function of a simple organizer. He took the roles of an initiator, supervisor, mentor, and producer, working closely with the artist in a collaborative role. The curator's transformative function positioned him as a creative force, responsible for producing unique ideas and nurturing major works that deeply impact the public's awareness.

The second revolutionary curatorial practice is the "Do it" project by Hans Ulrich Obrist, initiated in 1994 and continues to attract audiences until now. Obrist's novelty resides in the act of soliciting artists to furnish sets of instructions for the production of artworks. Subsequently, these instructions are made readily available to the broad communities, fostering engagement from individuals across the globe to interpret and actualize the artwork. "Do It" transformed the role of curators, pushing them to the status of facilitators, mediators, and catalysts in the realm of artistic creation. The initiative adopts a cooperative and interactive philosophy, making the artistic process accessible to all.

I invite you to explore this book with a fresh, unconventional approach. Imagine yourself as Robinson Crusoe, newly awakened on a deserted island. Embrace a spirit of discovery as you search for the unknown, the unexplored, the unspoken, the unwritten, the uncreated, and the raw.

Sharon Toval

יווהה -יא-ללח ללכבו רצוא–ללח ,ןמא-הפוצ-הריצי ,ללח-ןמא-רצוא

INSTALLATIONS+

MARTIN VISOK

ELAD ARGMAN

AVINOAM STERNHEIM

JONATHAN REINER

DANIELLE FELDHAKER

AMIR ROZEI

ORNA OREN IZRAELI

RONIT MIRSKY

YONATAN ULLMAN

OPHIRA SPITZ

LIDA SHARET MASSAD

HILA LAISER BEJA

VARDI BORBOW

NAAMA OPPENHEIM

MASKIT GOLAN

RONI BEN PORAT

AVNER SHER

VARDI BOBROW WORKING WOMAN 2022

Multidisciplinary artist Vardi Bobrow transformed the space of The Lab into a factory, producing nylon fibers and wooden handles. She designed a variety of cleaning brushes for her evolving, sitespecific art installation.

The artistic move called into question the essence of a place in relation to the act of creation and the course of an exhibition in a space designated as an art space. The Lab became a hybrid of a factory and a studio. If so, what did it present: functional objects or artworks? What distinguished a work of art?

What significance did the function of the displayed objects have? Did the function detract from or enhance the piece's aura? The entire experiment was documented with a closed-circuit camera, as was the use of projection materials in the space itself.

Photography: Youval Hai

PERFORMANCE+

CHANCHAL BANGA

ADINA BAR-ON

MORAN SANDEROVICH

YAEL BRONNER RUBIN

MORAN ASRAF

INBAL MARIE COHEN

ETHAN DOR SHAV + ZAZUA

ETHAN DOR SHAV ZAZUA 2019

For the Illustration Week in Tel Aviv 2019,

The Lab invited the Zazua dance, sound, and drawing incubator to perform a series of

moving experiments.

For the Illustration Week in Tel Aviv 2019, I invited the Zazua dance, sound, and drawing incubator to perform a series of moving experiments at The Lab. A large sheet of paper was unrolled across the stage. For 30-50 minutes, there was a dynamic interplay between the painter and the dancers, accompanied by live music, transforming the paper into an Action Portrait—a collective memory, almost Tantric in nature,

encapsulating the shared experience. Throughout the performance, the dancer moved across the paper while the action painter traced the dance, capturing its essence. The ticking clock turned the performance from an improvisation into a real-time creation, with the audience evolving from mere spectators to witnesses of a "revelation."

Sound: Nir Jacob Younessi, Gal Azoulay, Yuval B.

Dance: Ethan Dor Shav, Gilad Goral, Galia Gal Srebernik, Gal Ben Haim, Liza Poterman.

VIDEO & SOUND

DROR HIBSH

RAN SLAVIN

YOSSI BLOCH

MAYA SMIRA

NOA SHEIZAF

EYAL SEGAL

RAN SLAVIN RADIANCES 2023

Ran Slavin confronts us, human beings, with a mirror reflecting the turbulent era that humanity, and Israeli society, is facing.

The video installation is fast-paced and restless, akin to the speed of video works and the exponential acceleration of external changes: digital, virtual, 3D, holographic, and AI. Our brains, a product of the same evolution, struggle to cope with such rapidity, resulting in leaps in cognition alongside gaps in both

psychological and physical memory. The sequence of events, as we experience it, has lost all equilibrium. Is this imbalance the new balance? Is equilibrium a fiction that has now been replaced by holographic reality? How are we to cope with it?

Photography: Youval Hai, Ran Slavin.

PAINTING & DRAWING+

MICHEL PLATNIC & RAN SLAVIN

LILI COHEN PRAH-YA

TAMAR RODED

SHABTAY

OLEG BABICH

MATAN OREN

ROTEM RESHEF

SHIRA GEPSTEIN & SHAi AZOULAY

YOAV BRENER

SAPIR GUEZ

TAMAR RODED SHABTAY DESERT CREATURE 2024

Tamar Roded Shabtay presented a new series of paintings and artworks, created in symbiotic connection with her surroundings in the Kanaim Valley, nestled in the heart of the Judean Desert.

In the desert, she gathered organic materials—porcupine quills, peacock feathers—which she wove into her multi-media installation at The Lab. Over time, this extreme, awe-inspiring, and intimidating landscape permeated her body and consciousness, emerging vividly in her work. When the desert seeps into the soul, it strips away superficial layers, uncovering only the essentials. Her paintings, once thick with oil, grew diluted, almost ethereal, as the figures appeared lifeless and posed in unnatural forms. Their

bodies, drained of substance, embodied a passion that transcended life’s conventional functions, freeing itself from socio-political constraints. Shabtai’s work expressed a profound wish to release the body, particularly the female body, from institutional forces that seek to restrain it.

Her connection to the wild desert was no accident; its natural laws, untouched by human control, reflected an inner desire for a life marked by free, tolerant, and balanced passion.

Photography: Youval Hai

CERAMIC+

The LAB INSTALLATIONS+

TALIA MUKMEL

ELIZAVETA GUSEVA

AHIA CANNA

TALIA MUKMEL IN THE THUNDER 2024

This installations include pieces like Newspaper Carpet, made of wet newspaper fragments, and Exhibition Journal—a display of glass jars containing extracts from squeezed newspapers.

Dr. Shlomit Bauman interviewed artist Talia Mukmel for Textura Magazine about her exhibition at The Lab. The project was created against the backdrop of turbulent times marked by the judicial revolution, the COVID-19 pandemic, and war, all of which influenced Mukmel's creative approach. Embracing a sense of uncertainty, Mukmel moved her workspace to The Lab, where over two weeks she developed installations using raw materials that explore her research into local material culture and her search for a sense of home and belonging.

Through these works, she reflected on daily life in Israel through news coverage, with the transparent liquids symbolizing

detachment and pain. In another piece, she created a 3.28-metertall column made of layered newspapers, symbolizing support and connection to place and time. As Mukmel explained, carpets and other domestic objects held more than functional value—they symbolized cultural identity and family heritage, carrying the emotional weight of home and continuity. Through the recurring motif of the carpet, Mukmel recalled her childhood, especially the blue Chinese carpet her grandparents brought from Chile, which served as a space of solace for her. This motif in her work represented stability within chaos, a comforting structure during challenging times.

Text from Interview summary, published in Textura Magazine, by Dr. Shlomit Bauman, 24.09.24.

Photography: Talia Mukmel.