The 2nd Tel Hai International Contemporary Art Meeting was scheduled for the summer of 1982, but due to the outbreak of the Lebanon War, the event was postponed to the following year. From 1980 to 1983 we – my companion, Daniel Davis, our son and daughter, and I – resided in Metula, a village bordering with Lebanon.
My impressions of the war are imprinted in the performance Salute.
The location for the performance was on the hill that merged the Tel Hai National Historic site with the National Reserve Park. The audience sat on the slope of the hill overlooking the four sites which composed my performance’s environment. Salute was performed twice, on two consecutive nights; the glimmer of lights from the city of Kiryat Shmona, in the valley south of Tel Hai, created a backdrop for these night-time performances.
Scene 1
– at the 1st site
At the foot of the hill, in its far edge, to the right, Daniel Davis[1] drilled a basin in the chalk rocks to which he drew water and created an artificial lake, or bath. A wooden box, about 180x45cm, painted black, was afloat on the water.
I stepped into the light and onto the box and stood exposed with the glimmer of Kiryat Shmona behind me. I wore a light blue metallic bodysuit with oval metal shields on my shoulders. I stood for a moment, on the farthest edge of the rectangular box, at the furthest point away from the audience, and when the moment elapsed, I bent my knees until they touched the box. I stretched my body forward so that both my shoulders were on the box and my arms rested, smug, along my sides. I forced my neck forward to a protruding position while my head turned upward, exposing my full face to the audience.
Then, I began moving my pelvis in an irregular circulating motion, while my back and chest responded in a motion of inward contraction and outward stretching. The audience on the hillside could decipher the curved back, with the chest contraction, and the pelvis when it circled to the side. I tried to hold my head lifted in a forward position and facing the audience, as best and as long as I was able to, while I pressed my lips together and lifted them until they touched my nose. This was an uncanny facial expression and together with the dynamic asymmetric round patterns of my pelvis, I thought I resembled a cat in the act of painful intercourse[2].
Next, I began to grind my shoulders, with the metal shields on them, onto the wooden surface of the hollow box. An empty sound loudly irrupted through microphones which were placed inside the box. As my movement intensified, the noise of shields beating the surface and rubbing against the wood surface began to suggest a rhythm.
I then lay straight and on my back, with my head at the very front of the rectangular box; I was like a stroke of a brush of light blue and metallic color that aligned the black of the box, which aligned with the water. I raised one clenched fist, perpendicular to my body, and remained in that way for a several minutes. Then, I raised my other fist, clenched; I alternated hands and at intervals I raised both above my head, parallel to each other. Finally, I stood up and stepped backwards letting the length of the box extend before me. I peeled the bodysuit off, slowly, and the metallic light-blue condensed to a small pile that marked the black surface.
I bent down to a reclining position, and then I sat down, allowing my feet to hang down the side of the box. When I could feel the water, I plunged into the bath. Standing in the water which covered my knees, I rested my arm on the surface of the box while my second arm stretched out to the water; my palm swayed through the water letting the quiver of the waves part my fingers. I made gentle swaying movements, in half circles, forward and backward, around myself, creating a pleasing trickle sound that was projected audibly by microphones that were situated above the water and surrounding the pool. I repeated the movements and listened, until I immersed my entire body in the water. With my head just above the water, I leaned slightly forward and held out both arms in front of me, opening and closing them, making waves. I repeated the movement with all my strength until the sound of the moving water was very loud. The visual quotation “Woman Bathing”, from art-history, is associated with tender feminine sensuality, but here, the presence of the black box and my abrupt movement had transformed the vision to an unsettling one.
Scene 2
-at the 2nd site:
A slanting stage covered with mortar[3], with several white sculpted clay cats seated spaciously on the slanting platform; the cats’ eyes, which were painted in nickel, shined brightly under the spotlights.
I appeared on the top edge of the slanted platform. I wore a white blouse, black shorts and pink shoes. I crouched in a profile position with a rounded back, my knees were bent, resting on my feet which were on tiptoes. While stretching up and outward, straining, in the crouching position, I turned my face towards the audience while pressing my lips together and lifting them until they touched my nose in that familiar uncanny expression. I then proceeded down and across the slanted platform to destroy each of the sculpted cats[4]. I vandalized each sculpture separately and one at a time. I changed my body position, standing, reclining, laying down, as each sculpted cat was treated with a different abusive approach: banging it on to the floor, pulling it by its ears, throwing it over the platform[5].
Scene 3
-at the 3rd site:
The third scene took place on top of a three-meter tower.
I climbed a ladder attached to the construction, to its top, and on a rather small area I began to stamp my feet creating rhythmic jumps which resonated by the neck mic set on my shirt. I jumped and stamped my feet in rhythmic intervals, 3-4 minutes each time, and stopped in order to address the audience below, to my right and left, in front of me and beyond into the vast span of the audience on the side of the mountain – in my articulated gibberish. My association was a political speech which I had named ” Begin’s Speech to the nation”[6]. The audience seated on the slope laughed loudly, especially when I paused for another tantrum of jumps and feet stamping.
Scene 4
– at the 4th site:
The final scene took place amongst the audience, rather than in front of it, to a powerful recording of a tribal chant, rhythmic and loud, by a Native American musician (whose name I cannot recall).
In the midst of the seated crowd, I was turning around in one spot, my elbows bent and hands upwards to my sides, in a victorious position. As I circled, the audience seated farther away rose to their feet, and was gathering around me. As twenty minutes elapsed the sound became more intense and so did my expression of power and elation, which was contagiously intertwining with the audience to a summit.
[1] Daniel Davis, my companion, and father of our son and daughter. Daniel was a ceramics artist until 1997. From 1998, he created paper-cut artwork which was inspired by nature and texts from the Holy Scriptures. Though I have earned the credits as The Artist, in my performance-work, it was Daniel who, during the first decade, realized all the installation and sights of my performance-art.
[2] During the war, the small family-run pensions were inhabited by the IDF, and the village became a military thoroughfare. The main streets, usually quaint, were now overpopulated by cats and small kittens due to the accumulation of un-discarded garbage.
[3] It was Daniel’s decision to cover the surface of the platform with mortar since it was readily available in those natural surroundings. The mortar that covered the slanted platform was harsh and painful to the touch of my skin, and I was hopeful that the physical discomfort will be noticed and add another dimension to the situation.
[4] The cats which were sculpted and then molded by Daniel were inspired by a true experience; during a walk on the main street of Metula, I saw soldiers playing a “game”: Who could run over, with his army vehicle, more of the kittens rummaging in the piles of rubbish?
[5] At the end of both performances, many individuals from the audience rushed to the slanting mortar platform in order to collect the broken cats.
[6] Menachem Begin was the Israeli Prime Minister during the 1st Lebanon War.
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