Noa Bloch: A Dim Memory of Clear Consciousness

Curator: Tal Yahas

The objects in this installation are taken from a hospital environment associated with extreme states: birth and death, illness and healing, despair or hope. Bloch's installation is based on her personal memories of being hospitalized, and focuses on the experience of purification that she underwent during her two hospital stays. She describes these periods as endowing her with a sense of rare inner peace and a lucid experience of pure being, attained by a detachment from exterior reality and from everyday life.

Familiar hospital imagery is treated in this installation by means of a materiality that is simultaneously transparent and opaque, fragile and soft, exposed and protective. The various objects are clearly identifiable, yet their presence is understated and unobtrusive - as if they themselves faced a process of material dissolution. The separating curtains, which the artist refers to as "Jacob's Ladder," are made of parchment paper; the pattern that covers the Hadassa hospital sheets forms an almost invisible, raised design upon their surface. According to the artist, the allusion to this biblical scene is related to "the flickering pattern, which transports the viewer into a dream state; the movement within the pattern is like the movement of the angels in the biblical story, a kind of subtle protective presence." The glass windows are decorated with a looser reproduction of the same pattern - which is duplicated by means of thin, colorful threads joined together with wax. The wax coating allows a soft light to filter into the space, while preventing the exterior from penetrating into the sterile room.

The food tray - a glazed ceramic cast - stands out among these various objects due to its harrowing presence. The contours of untouched food items blend into the contours of the plastic wrap that covers them. This image endows the work with a sense of impending extinction, yet according to the artist it signifies the purification of the body. The image of the recumbent woman was drawn in white wax on a transparent glass window - resulting in a barely visible outline of an injured, limp body. In contrast to most of the objects in this exhibition, which are life size, the figure in the wax drawing has been reduced in size, as if it had regressed into a child-like state in which only its most essential qualities persist. "The body is suddenly exposed in intimate situations," says the artist, "yet these situations lose their sexual connotations in the medical context; feelings of embarrassment are replaced by a sense of equanimity in relation to the body, and by a recognition of its humanity. The contact with the environment is radically altered: the senses are subdued, one has no appetite, desires and urges are suppressed and time loses its significance. This detachment from exterior reality and from quotidian needs allows for an experience of calm acceptance, a sense of presence and of being that does not require any justification."

Noa Bloch was born in Jerusalem (1979). She is a graduate of the Department of Ceramic Design at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem (2002-2006); during this time, she participated in a student exchange program at the Rhode Island School of Design (2004); she has also studied art at the Jerusalem Art Center (2001-2002). Her work was included in a group exhibition at the Woods Gerry Gallery in Providence, Rhode Island (2004). She lives and works in Jerusalem.

Acknowledgements: 
Hava Bloch, Hadara Rabinowitz, Hilla Lulu Lin