Fantasy meets reality in botanical art exhibit
‘The Nature of Things’ is now showing at new art gallery in Jerusalem Botanical Gardens
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
Art imitates nature and vice versa at the Tropical Conservatory Gallery in Jerusalem’s Botanical Gardens.
Nothing appears as it should in “The Nature of Things” exhibit, where a bouquet of flowers is formed from wax, fake lilies float in a pool of viscous black liquid and a collage displays dystopian flora and fauna.
The exhibit, which can be viewed through June 22, was curated by Neta Gal-Azmon with collaborating artists Dina Shenhav, Shira Zelwer, Vered Aharonovitch, Ayelet Karmi, Einat Arif-Galanti and Yaala Getzov.
The exhibit is all about the connections between the gardens and nature, said Botanical Gardens head curator Gaby Hamburg-Fima.
“The gardens involve research that tries to understand what grows here,” said Hamburg-Fima. “The exhibit is asking the question about what is natural and what is man-made.”
It’s a discussion that takes place in the gardens themselves, where a wide variety of species are grown and cultivated as part of the botanical research.
And it continues in the small but worthwhile gallery abutting the tropical conservatory, inviting a regular rotation of curators and artists — managed by Hamburg-Fima, the garden’s in-house curator — to comment on different aspects of nature.
Artworks were already part of the garden’s landscape, beginning during the pandemic, when “Returning to Nature,” a circular sculpture around the gardens’ paths. was put in place. That was followed by “Seeing the Invisible,” an augmented reality artwork by 13 artists, including Ai Weiwei and Isaac Julien, that was a collaboration of a dozen gardens in six countries.
“There’s potential in the gardens because of their open space,” said Hamburg-Fima. “The gardens are becoming an art institution, which is unusual but it’s because of the connection between art and the content of the garden.”
That introduction of artwork into the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens paved the way for Hamburg-Fima’s role, as head curator running the various art spaces at the gardens.
She now invites outside curators several times each year — “The Nature of Things” is the second exhibit so far — to choose works and create exhibits that both bring new audiences and welcome regular visitors to see something a little different.
The gardens are also planning to place art galleries in two other areas of the 30-acre botanical space adjacent to Hebrew University’s Givat Ram campus.
As for the gallery situated in the same building as the tropical conservatory, visitors can enter the gallery via the conservatory or from a separate entrance. Either way, the art gallery is clearly an extension of the flora and fauna in the gardens.
There’s a sense of fantasy here, in Dina Shenhav’s pool of viscous black water that mimics the gardens’ lily pad lake at the entrance, but this one has plastic flowers emerging from it.
Nearby is Shira Zelver’s elegant, lifelike wax bouquet, and Einat Arif-Galanti’s videos at the entrance to the exhibit are stop-motion works reimagining plastic and garbage as bouquets.
Ayelet Karmi brings dreamlike paper bird wings and a deer caught in a web of branches, and Yaala Getzov’s wall-size collage in which bees and ants are the giants in fields of flowers.
“It’s playing a game of what’s real and what’s not,” said Hamburg-Fima, and it’s up to visitors to decide what they’re looking at.
The Tropical Conservatory Gallery at the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens is open Sun 10 a.m.-3 p.m., Mon-Thurs 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Fri 9 a.m.-2 p.m., Sat 9 a.m.-3 p.m.
The exhibition is included in the admission price. There are art workshops taking place during the exhibition, with information published on the gardens’ Facebook page and website.
