Gate of Paradise

Relief: sawdust, glue, field stones (calcite crystals, Eliyahu stones, and more), oak gall wasp galls, shells, cotton resin, drill holes, and more
204 × 186 × 10 cm.

Photo: Efrat Lebber

From the exhibition ‘natural sciences’, Zuzu Gallery, Curator- Rotem Ritov

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The work was created in response to Porta del Paradiso by Lorenzo Ghiberti, and constructed as an alternative gate — local, perishable, and organic — that reexamines the stories of women from the Bible and Jewish mythology. The panels are composed of sculptural reliefs that parallel the original scenes, but tell a different story: one in which biblical female figures seek visibility, action, and change.

The works are made from materials collected during walks in nature — sawdust, seeds, shells, stones — and were built on the frame of my own bed, using a manual technique that emphasizes traces, carvings, and fingerprints, echoing the paths carved by insects in mud. In this way, a connection is formed between the forces of nature and the female body as a creative, renewing, and present force.

Alongside this installation, two additional and more abstract works are presented. These explore the primal energy of creation and archetypal feminine vitality. While not dependent on one another, their joint presentation deepens the overall reading. The shared display reflects an inner dialogue between the figurative and the abstract, offering a more sensory response to didactic narratives. Each work stands on its own and can be exhibited independently.

This material language offers a different reading of paradise and creation — not as a lofty, eternal threshold, but as a living, breathing space that invites the viewer to reconsider familiar stories from a new perspective. The work emphasizes values of justice, repair, inclusion, and collective memory — and echoes the importance of representing the female voice.