The way we wore: Textile exhibits weave local history of fabric craft

The art of textiles is examined in five related shows at the Herzliya Museum, while an exhibit of recycled materials at Hiriya looks at the waste created by the fashion industry

Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center

  • Gur Inbar 'Yarn of Clay' wool thread hand-tufted for the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Credit David Seth)
    Gur Inbar 'Yarn of Clay' wool thread hand-tufted for the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Credit David Seth)
  • Gali Cnaani's work in the exhibit 'Textile–Art–Textile: Perspectives on Then and Now,' at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Jessica Steinberg/Times of Israel)
    Gali Cnaani's work in the exhibit 'Textile–Art–Textile: Perspectives on Then and Now,' at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Jessica Steinberg/Times of Israel)
  • Siona Shimshi's Untitled 1963-1972, for Maskit from the Shenkar Fashion and Textile Archive (Credit Ahikam Ben Yosef)
    Siona Shimshi's Untitled 1963-1972, for Maskit from the Shenkar Fashion and Textile Archive (Credit Ahikam Ben Yosef)

Two very different exhibits in central Israel — one at a Herzliya museum and one at a former landfill — pull on a common thread to unravel the various ways people use, and reuse, textiles.

At Herzliya’s Museum of Contemporary Art, visitors can explore five separate but related exhibits in “Textile–Art–Textile: Perspectives on Then and Now,” open through May 1.

Aya Lurie, director and chief curator of the museum, took a page from other museums and biennales, fusing crafts and designs into fine art displays. She then brought in guest curators who specialize in the field.

The exhibits include an astonishing collection of 37 established and upcoming artists, opening with Gur Inbar’s amoeba-shaped tufted rugs hung on the exposed cement walls at the museum entrance. The rugs are inspired by his longtime ceramic work.

Across the way is a gallery showing Siona Shimshi’s familiar and distinctive fabric patterns produced from the 1960s to the 1980s, inspired by Judaica, the Pop Art movement, 1970s psychedelics and flower children. Her work has shown up in everything from tablecloths, curtains and pillows of the period to clothing designs from the Maskit fashion house.

Nearby is a gallery of paintings by Fatima Abu Roomi, a Nazareth artist who creates wonderfully detailed self-portraits that incorporate bits of textiles, carpets and traditional embroidery.

Fatima Abu Roomi in a self-portrait, ‘Fatma 2019,’ part of the exhibit ‘Close to Herself: Fatima Abu Roomi at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Credit Daniel Segel)

The largest exhibit in the show is “Structures: Weaving in Israel, from Functionalism to Fiber Art.” The exhibit, guest curated by Noga Bernstein, offers a backwards look at the art of weaving, beginning with the work of German-born Julia Keiner, who came to Israel in 1936 and established a weaving department at Jerusalem’s Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design.

The department was later moved to the Shenkar School of Design in Tel Aviv.

“She did in Jerusalem what she learned in the Bauhaus [art school in Germany],” said Lurie.

Bernstein includes fabrics and a Maskit coat made of fabric by Keiner’s student Neora Warshavsky, who wove her fabrics by hand and sold bolts to French couture designer Christian Dior as well as the local Maskit label created by Ruth Dayan.

“Nothing here is industrial,” said Lurie. “That’s why Maskit was so expensive.”

Julia Keiner in the weaving department of Bezalel in 1950, at the Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, open through May 1, 2025 (Credit Werner Brown)

The exhibit shows a timeline of weaving and textiles, with some of the pieces rescued from homes and archival collections often buried deep in drawers and long forgotten, said Lurie.

The more contemporary works include pieces by Gali Cnaani, who designed the fabric walls in the new National Library of Israel building, and a tapestry by Aleksandra (Sasha) Stoyanov, a Ukrainian-born artist who lives near Yokne’am, buys her wool from Bedouin shepherds, and has one of her works hanging in New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The final gallery in the Herzliya Museum is devoted to the exhibit “Eternal Spring,” showing the fronts and backs of the tapestries once produced at Itche Mambush’s workshop in the Ein Hod artist colony in Israel’s north.

Siona Shimshi’s Untitled 1963-1965, courtesy Shenkar Fashion and Textile Archive (Credit Ahikam Ben Yosef)

The commissioned artists would spend nine months creating a design that was then translated into woven work that was somewhere between drawings and textiles, offering a look at both sides of the process.

“Textile–Art–Textile: Perspectives on Then and Now” is open through May 1, 2025.

Second life

For those willing to take in two exhibits on one day, take a half-hour drive (if traffic cooperates) to the Environmental Education Center at the Hiriya Recycling Park, where six artists focus on filaments of fiber in “Thread for a Thought.”

Hiriya is a former landfill that today houses industrial recycling plants, a nature park and more. It is a natural place for an exhibit that focuses on the waste created by the fashion and textiles industry, which churns out endless garments and other items, many of which end up in the trash.

The exhibit, which is open through June 30, includes the works of artists Gili Avissar, Yael Yaari, Nir Ohayon, Rosello Shamria, Lone Nielsen and Nissan Shor.

It is mostly set in the upper gallery of the spacious education center, a light-filled space dedicated to learning about recycling and creative ways to use recycled goods.

A visitor to the Hiriya Recycling Park stands below Yael Yaari’s soft textile sculptures at ‘Thread for Thought,’ open through June 30, 2025. (Jessica Steinberg/Times of Israel)

Each artwork takes a unique look at the path of a thread, from Ohayon’s fantastical spider-like sculpture crafted from remnants of shoes (mostly sneakers), to Nielsen’s hot pink thread unraveling from a sweater, weaving itself into a threaded kite.

Several three-dimensional soft sculptures by Yael Yaari are made from stuffed pieces of fabric, while Gili Avishar’s massive quilt is made from previously used fabrics, with the feel of a large, hulking but gentle beast.

The center’s focus on recycling extends beyond the exhibit and even to trash receptacles themselves. Among the items crafted out of familiar cypress green garbage cans are chairs, fences and one fantastical flowering bush.

Guided tours available at 12:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, with prior registration at the center.

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