BLISS

2025 Video Installation (10 minutes)

Ticho House, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem

Curator of Ticho House: Timna Seligman

Thematically connected to the video works inside Ticho House, the two site-specific works shown in the garden were inspired by its vegetation. In the first, leaves and branches were digitally processed to create the illusion of stone relief tablets embedded in the façade of the house, thus echoing the ancient mythological and architectural motifs alluded to in Bliss and Zahara. The three-screen video work shows an infinite loop of movement, a wave and shudder of leaves and bodies. The leaves and branches, like Zahara’s wing, are on display in the house. Both were created through a long process of observation and craft by Carmi. Whether wing or leafy branch, each element was meticulously prepared taking care to consider the changing shades of the leaves as the seasons unfold and the colors of the shimmering feathers dependent on where on the wing they are placed. Through these objects and their use in the videos, Carmi, the painter and sculptor and Heiman, the photographer highlight their own separate disciplines complimented in the performative aspects of the videos.

Together the two works in the garden address our disconnection from the soil and from nature. Natural materials are transformed into something unnatural: painted plastic leaves and feathers, digital images. Even as Carmi and Heiman engage with the subject of sustainable harmony with nature, they also point out our distance from it.