“HomeLessHome”

Jerusalem. Nothing simply is. Every layer is evanescent with history, symbolism and ideology, and each multiplies in relation to the other. The battles are real—constant contestation about land, rights, meaning and place. Judea, Samaria, Palestine, Israel, the West Bank, the Occupied Territories, all names and causes for building and rebuilding. Rubble and aspirations are everywhere, palpably so on the Seam, the street that divides East from West Jerusalem and the location of the Museum on the Seam.

In existence since 1999, the museum is a socio-political museum of contemporary art with a history of mounting one major exhibition per year. Curator Raphie Etgar notes in the exhibition catalogue, “we keep reflecting from within its walls on the reality surrounding us and on our humble contribution to the improvement of the present state of affairs.”

“HomeLessHome” is both broadly writ and specifically delineated: at its core are the dimensions and implications of the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli conflicts. Etgar draws upon internationally known artists from biennales and national exhibitions to support his exhibition theses. The selection of local artists brings specificity to the theme. In “HomeLessHome,” photographs of a modern-day Ishmael, the Roaring Lion monument of Zion, Palestinian refugee camps, Jewish settlements and withdrawals are at the structuring centre of the exhibition. They re-direct our gaze on “the real” outside the door. Didacticism is countered by having artists define the terms, context and boundaries of the debate through allegory, allusion and imagination. There is nothing quite like Israeli artist Dana Levy’s Treehouse video, made during Israel’s disengagement from Gaza in 2005; or Haleh Anvari’s “Magic Suitcase” photographs, where displacement and culture clash are the norm; or Yael Bartana’s video, Summer Camp, of housing being re-established by the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. Unlike the wrangling, reduction and rhetoric of politics, this sprawling complexity by artists, sensitively structured for punch and reflection by Etgar, comes as a relief.

“HomeLessHome” spreads throughout the three floors, roof and façade of the building, a former military outpost from 1948–1967. You enter through Chiharu Shiota’s exterior installation of black rope stretched taught over the façade. From the distance, it feels like barbed wire surrounding the museum; at closer view, it seems to describe a shaky enterprise held taut. Inside, retrofitted to accommodate art, the walls retain small windows with sliding shutters and bolts, steely reminders of the war zone.

“HomeLessHome” includes works by about 40 artists from around the globe, with much photography, video, installation and sculpture. Signage is at a minimum. The on-site, self-guiding program includes a text and an entry for each artist. Many works are drawn from artists’ sustained projects, and the viewer benefits from the prolonged artistic engagements and condensations. Ivan Navarro’s Lost Hole Way is a commercial glass door with fittings installed against the museum’s wall across from the main entrance. It cannot be opened. Through the use of mirrors and light behind the door, it creates the illusion of future pathways without entry. Made in the context of the Chilean dictatorship and democratic impasse, the work establishes an allegory around space and access.

Most works are worthy of deep attention, functioning along an elastic continuum—closer to or more different from the theme. The brilliant work on the main floor moves the viewer from what is conceptual and problematic, through concrete illustration, geopolitical example and poignant cruelty. A floor-to-ceiling installation of domestic objects folded and readied for a move by Alfredo and Isabel Aquilizan speaks of migrant life in the packing and compacting of belongings. Sudanese refugees, photographed by Natan Dvir, languish in a complicated juridical limbo. Michael Wolf’s photographs of public housing in Hong Kong focus on the tenants who live in spaces of 100 by 100 feet. Russian apartment buildings, figured here by Peter Belyi as so much crumbling drywall, are in states of decomposition. In photographs by Liu Bolin, Chinese artists about to be displaced from their artists’ village, Suojiacun, become one with the walls through camouflaged outfits of brick and mortar. In a video wall projection by Guli Silberstein, news footage is repeated, pixilated and repurposed in slow motion. A Palestinian house is being demolished. The shrieks are audible from the front door. Shock, disbelief, anguish.

In one of my favourite pieces, a silent video, burly men and trailing women move a piano at night, in the rain, alongside cars, towards customs and through borders. The duty free shops are closed. Lights flash on the highway. Neither comedy nor parody, it is a work of realist re-enactment by video artist Ergin Çavusoglu, screened on a small, free-standing monitor. The artist has recreated a moment from 1989 when 300,000 Ethnic Turks in Bulgaria were given hours to flee. It is poetry against futility. The inclination is to trot politicians, soldiers and war mongers of all stripes through the main floor.

There are stunning works in “HomeLessHome.” Lida Abdul’s White House about Afghanistan, produced in Banff, is one of the most poignant and elegant videos around. Hema Upadhyay mimics the slum conditions of Mumbai and Calcutta with massed up piles of small metal homes, ready to be destroyed by a front-end loader. The views from within each artist’s individual psyche coalesce at the museum’s roof, where an additional four works have been installed. Josephin Meckseper’s intractable black sculpture mimics the shape and form of Muslim headdress and military bunker. Its density, weight and impenetrability function as a political metaphor for current peace negotiations.

Things are a bit grim on the roof. Ghosts from the 1948 War. Zones and lines of Occupation. Any elation of soaring heights and Old City views must grapple with the political realities. To the east and south, Islamic Mosques. Just below, an Orthodox Jewish school and playground where a child runs on a wheel fixed to the ground. The building barely contains the neighbourhood. Its location, on the Seam, is its potency. ❚

“HomeLessHome” was exhibited at the Museum on the Seam in Jerusalem from January 14 to September 3, 2010.

Amy Karlinsky is a Winnipeg-based writer.