Liav Mizrahi. Charity Will Save from Death – The German Project

About

The site-specific installation „Charity Will Save from Death – The German Project“ by Liav Mizrahi takes the concept of an exhibition by the artist in 2022 in the Ein Harod museum in northern Israel and adapts it to the context of the presentation in Berlin. The basic idea of both exhibitions is to give a new visibility to female artists who were active during the founding period of the State of Israel, as their names have also been suppressed from the collective memory due to a male-dominated art historiography. While the exhibition at the Mishkan Museum of Art, founded in 1937 by members of the En Harod kibbutz, focused on both Jewish and Arab women artists, Mizrahi’s “The German project” focused on women artists who were born in Germany and emigrat ed to British Mandate Palestine before World War II. These include Hannah Levi (1914–2006), Aliza Nahor (1915–1987), Friedel Stern (1917–2006), Käthe Ephraim-Marcus (1892–1970) and Esther Berli-Joel (1895–1972).

Mizrahi juxtaposes the works and biographies of these five women artists who escaped the Shoah with the names of women artists who were murdered by the extermination machinery of Nazi Germany. His installation, consisting of original works by the artists, sculptures and text elements, aims to work against forgetting; both in Israel and in Germany.Mizrahi juxtaposes the works and biographies of these five artists who escaped the Shoah and whose works are shown with the names of five artists who were murdered by the extermination machinery of National Socialist Germany. Their names are: Amalie Seckbach (1870 – 1944), Ilse von Twardowski (1880 – 1942), Rosy Lilienfeld (1896 – 1942), Friedl Dicker (1898 – 1944) and Charlotte Salomon (1917 – 1943). In the middle of the exhibition space are rolled up white woolen blankets that are stacked like logs in a pyramidal shape and on which are written the names of the murdered women artists. For the duration of the exhibition, the artist symbolically places a grave for them that they did not receive in the extermination camps.

Liav Mizrahi (*1977) studied art in Haifa, Düsseldorf and Jerusalem until 2008 and lives in Tel Aviv. He is the curator of the exhibition Who by Fire: On Israel at Haus am Lützowplatz (June 9–August 27, 2023). Salon Avitall – Jewish Center for Arts and Culture is a cooperation partner of this project.