Elad Kopler: 7 Paintings catalog

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Elad Kopler: 7 Paintings


Elad Kopler: 7 Paintings March 2022 – Jun 2022 Catalogue editors: Orit Ephrat-Moscovitz, Hadas Glazer Design: Moria Bachar English translation and text editor: Daria Kassovsky Photography: Youval Hai Measurements are given in centimeters, height x length

Cover: Detail from Nine-Eight, 2021, Acrylic and, oil on canvas Inside cover: Detail from Genesis, 2021, Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas

Litvak Contemporary 3 Shvil Hamifal Street, Tel Aviv 66535, ISRAEL +972-3-7163897 www.litvakcontemporary.com © 2022 All rights reserved to Litvak Contemporary, Tel Aviv



The Press of History: On Elad Kopler’s Works March 2022 Hadas Maor When I encountered Elad Kopler’s current cluster of works during a preliminary studio visit, some were spread out on the floor, and some were hanging directly on the walls of the space, without any rear frame, support, or stretcher. The looseness of the canvas thus exposed allowed the intense materiality of the painterly act to erupt, making the tension between the absence of an outer frame and the multiplicity of inner frames in the works the decisive element in contemplating them. The cluster includes large, colorful works, stormy and at the same time orderly, presenting an assortment of refracted gazes, reflections, and forms, subjected to what appears to be an ongoing struggle between dispersal and convergence. The relinquishment of the painting’s frame, of the full stretching of the canvas, during the work process, is what generated the multiple inner demarcations and the engagement with the tension between abstraction and regulation. The act of painting itself involved the use of a wide variety of materials, including oil, acrylic and spray paints, oil pastels, markers, etc., and the materials’ non-hierarchical application on a bare, unprimed canvas is what enabled this seemingly impossible combination.

Alongside the direct application of paint, Kopler also used an imprinting technique by painting on papers of different sizes, soaking them in paint, and using a roller to transfer the paint and embed it into the works. Due to the imprinting act, these parts of the works are a negative drawing rather than a positive painting, and the distinction between the various layers of the paintings is blurred. Moreover, through the use of imprinting, Kopler created the internal geometric division which lends the works qualities of aerial photography or a map, referring to territorial as well as ornamental aspects. The papers themselves function as a kind of private diary, in which the history of painting is contained and recorded. Each paper evokes a different context from the history of art, from the figurative to the abstract, from the historical to the contemporary, from the lush and abundant to the frugal and minimalistic; a melting pot of themes, colors, and practices, that seems to be flattened and smoothed into a single compressed whole.


Internal frames have appeared in Kopler’s work in the past, but in this group of works they take on a different meaning. In earlier works the architectural context of the imprinted frames was intense and direct: windows, doors, scaffolding, bars, etc., but the continuous attempt to deliver the description of the space from the boundaries of logic seems to culminate in the current body of work, where the descriptive aspect of the three-dimensional space seems to have been pressed.

multiplied, been broken up and have diversified. There are spaces today of every kind and every size, for every use and every function. To live is to pass from one space to another, while doing your very best not to bump yourself.”1 Kopler’s works indeed present a multiplicity of spaces, but these invade each other beyond recognition, and the struggle to produce clear boundaries and distinctions between them seems a priori doomed to failure.

The various frames in the works may be construed as a repeated engagement with the window in art, from the window facing outwards to the world as a metaphor for interior-exterior relations, to the window as a principled frame, which allows for flattening or abstraction of the world. At the same time they can also be regarded as evidence of the implosion of different worlds into the act of painting; periods, gestures, and ideas, swallowed up as into a black hole where the energy is so dense that it jumbles and erodes everything in its vicinity. In his book Species of Spaces, George Perec maintained that there is no longer one space, but only multiple small bits of space: “Spaces have

1 Georges Perec, Species of Spaces and Other Pieces, ed. and trans.: John Sturrock (London: Penguin, 1997 [1974]), p. 6.


Elad Kopler Frost, 2021 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 180 x 218

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Elad Kopler Chess in Spring, 2021 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 176 x 137

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Elad Kopler Time Regained, 2021 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 184 x 138

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Elad Kopler Genesis, 2021 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 180 x 230

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Elad Kopler Deep into the Forest, 2021 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 185 x 215

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Elad Kopler Nine-Eight, 2021 Acrylic and oil on canvas 175 x 164

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Elad Kopler Berlin, 2020 Oil, acrylic and spray paint on canvas 170 x 220

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Elad Kopler Born in Ramat Gan, Israel, 1974. Lives and works in Tel Aviv and Ein Gedi, Israel.

SOLO & DUO EXHIBITIONS 2022

7 Paintings, Litvak Contamporary, Tel Aviv, Curator: Hadas Glazer.

2019

Border Disorder, Baari Gallery, curator: Dr. Ziva Jelin, Isreal.

2017

Dread & Delight, The Nahum Gutman Museum of Art, Tel-Aviv

GROUP EXHIBITIONS 2020

Land No Land, Beit Hankin Multidisciplinary Gallery, curator: Neta Haber.

2018

Only Through Time Time is Conquered, DITTRICH & SCHLECHTRIEM gallery, Berlin.

VOLTA13 Basel, Art Fair 2017, Markthalle Basel, Switzerland.

2017

Imaginary Spaces: Works by Elad Kopler and Itamar Freed, Mana Contemporary, USA.

Ingathering, 10th Anniversary of Rappaport Prize, Tel Aviv Museum of Art.

2016

A Terrible Beauty is Born, Tivon Art Gallery, Kiryat-Tivon; curator: Michal Shachnai- Yacobi

2016

VOLTA NY Art Fair 2016, Pier 90, New York, USA.

2014

Eminent Domain, Feinberg Projects, Tel Aviv

Re Seek, START COLLECTION Gallery, Jaffo, curator: Carmit Blumensohn

2013

Elad Kopler: Temperatures, Rappaport Prize for a Young Israeli Painter, Tel Aviv Museum of Art; curator: Tal Lanir.

Modernism 2016, Rosenbach Contemporary, Jerusalem; curator: Nogah Davidson

2011

No Man’s Land, The Artists’ Studio, Tel Aviv; curator: Vered Gani

Druchim, Alma Center for the Arts, Zichron Yaakov, Israel; curator: Sarit Shapira

“Artist Room” Project, Artplus Hotel, Tel Aviv; curator: Dana Golan 2009

Black Clouds, Habres + Partner Gallery, Vienna After the Heat Wave, Tavi Dresner Gallery, Tel Aviv

2008

2007

Tishaa Ktarim, Soka Gallery, Tel Aviv; curator: Orly Dvir 2015

Mehilot, Beit Kaner Gallery, Rishon Le’Zion, Israel; curator: Galit Semel Akhshav: Contemporary Israeli Painting, Stein Rose Fine Arts, NY

Twilight, Biet Berl Academic College Gallery, curatorial team guided by David Ginaton

Dark Matter, Litvak Contemporary, Tel Aviv; curators: Howard Rutkowski, Mary Dinaburg

Ship of Fools, Kibbutz Be’eri Gallery, Kibbutz Be’eri; curator: Ziva Yelin

2014

Select Art Fair, Miami Art Week

When Despair Becomes Plausible, Tavi Dresdner Gallery, Tel Aviv

2012

Other Space, Feinberg Projects, Tel Aviv

Passages, Hamidrasha Gallery, Biet Berl Academic College

The Coming Community, Haifa Museum of Art, Haifa; curator: Yeela Hazut


Placing Time, Theatrical Exhibition in the Public Space; curators: Yael Tsabari, Hila Cohen Schneiderman 2010

International Sculpture Triennial, Poznan, Poland

2009

Crisis of the Genre, International Sculpture triennial, Poznan, Poland

2008

Postpop, Israeli Cartoon Museum, Holon; curator: Yuval Caspi In Silence, Rothschild Gallery 69, Tel Aviv; curator: Noam Segal

2005

Summer Exhibition, Braverman Gallery, Tel Aviv 2004

Graduates Exhibition, Hamidrasha School of Art, Beit Berl, Israel

2003

Wounded, Hamidrasha Gallery, Tel Aviv

2002

A Day Will Come: Artists for Arab– Israeli Coexistence, Umm ElFahm Gallery- Rosenfeld Gallery, Tel Aviv

Young Artist Award Winner Exhibition, Haifa Museum of Art; curators: Tami Katz-Freiman, Tal Yahas

2007

PRIZES / AWARDS

Etchings, Scratches and Scars, Petach Tikva Museum of Art, Petach Tikva, Israel; curator: Drorit Gur Arie

2013

Rappaport Prize for a Young Israeli Painter, Tel Aviv Museum

White, Tavi Dresdner Gallery; Tel Aviv

2007

Young Artist Award, Ministry of Science, Culture and Sport

Secret Art, Bank Hapoalim, Tel Aviv

2006

Award for Excellence, Bezalel Academy of Art Design

Under the Sun, Gilit Fisher Gallery, Tel Aviv

2005-07

America-Israel Cultural Foundation

By the Way, The Heder Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv

2004

Excellence Award Scholarship, Hamidrasha School of Art, Beit Berl Academic College

Above and Beyond, The Kibbutz Gallery, Tel Aviv 2006

Artik 7, America-Israel Cultural Foundation Award Winners, Ramat-Gan Museum

RESIDENCIES

Shoshelet, (Dynasty), Sapir College, Sderot, Israel 100 Years of Bezalel Art Academy, Ben Gurion Airport

2019

Yaddo artist residency, Saratoga Springs, NY, USA.

Graduate’s Program exhibition, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Tel Aviv

COLLECTIONS

Bezalel-Glasgow, Bezalel Gallery, Tel Aviv

The Tel Aviv Museum for Contemporary Art Collection (Israel)

Bezalel in Istanbul, Istanbul Biennial

The Petach Tikva Museum of Art Collection (israel) The Bank Ha’poalim Collection (Israel) Philip Hofer Collection, NY (USA)



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