Three artists, three questions: Millennials

Among the many exhibitions opened during the last months in Israel, I chose another three that caught my eye. This time, all artists represent the same generation: Millennials, aka Generation Y.

In their formative years, people of this generation (in general, not just artists) were exposed to the rise of social media, the iPhone’s invention, and the Internet’s common use. It has changed the way of research, with faster access to information and sharing visual art. The next generation, Z, already grew up in this new world connected online, while Millennials have been testing its possibilities, also in art. And just like in science and hi-tech, fields in which the Israelis have been very successful and acknowledged worldwide, this generation of Israeli artists established its solid position on the Israeli and international art scene.

The artists I talked to share a lot in common. They were all born in Israel in the 1980s and are very well educated, and despite their youth, they have already achieved success. They observe the surrounding reality and transfer it in non-obvious ways into their art. Also in common: They explore various media, such as photography, video, and video installations.

Having said this, these artists’ works have unique styles.

Three artists agreed to answer my three questions:

• What inspires you?
• What do you call art?
• What, in your opinion, makes your artwork different from that of other artists?

Haviv Kaptzon

• Born in 1983
• Lives and works in Tel Aviv

Haviv Kaptzon specializes in video and installation art, merging objects, drawings, and films. “The multidimensional approach is a key feature of my recent work,” he says. He explains that his video mapping goes beyond the usual rectangular video format by projecting onto objects and unusual surfaces, which transforms the space into a dynamic theater of objects and fragmented images. In his work The Naked Astronaut, exhibited at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, he projected a video onto a set of leaning walls, intentionally breaking the image into distinct fragments and channels.

At the Herzliya Museum, until the end of August, we can see Kaptzon’s video installation Weltschmerz, in which he searches the core of the meaning of humanity. His work feels very poetic; with some humor, it asks important existential questions and, at the same time, is very relevant to the present reality.

“I create art to make sense of the world and explore what it means to be human. I mix history, philosophy, bits of my own experiences, and Internet images to craft a complex yet cohesive visual and textual expression. My goal is to tell new stories by blending diverse information and imagery. I use different types of footage, from old videos and memes to YouTube clips, combined with my own recordings, ranging from casual iPhone shots to carefully planned scenes with professional actors.”

Kaptzon has held solo exhibitions, and his work has been featured in many group exhibitions in Israel. He is an alumnus of the Shankar School of Art and Design and the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design. He is the recipient of many awards, including the Keshet Award for Contemporary Art (2022), and the Young Artist Award from the Culture and Sport Ministry (2018). In 2016, Kaptzon received the Rabinovitch Foundation Grant; during the same year, he participated in A-Z West, Andrea Zittel’s residency program in the California high desert. He is one of the founding members of the Anti Mehikon artists collective.

• INSPIRATION: “I find inspiration in different places. I always have a sketchbook in my bag and a virtual one on my phone, so I can write down ideas that pop into my head from movies, books, YouTube videos, and Instagram posts. It may sound like a cliché, but some images come to me in my dreams. I write or sketch all of those ideas so I won’t lose any of them. And then I wait for a week or two before I go back to them. If the idea still sounds good to me, I can test it out. Inspiration, to me, is a long process of changing, forming, and connecting fragments into something new.”
• MEANING OF ART: “I have a very intimate and complex relationship with art. It is my way of trying to communicate my experience of the world. It rarely succeeds, but when it does, it is a great and meaningful moment. I think it’s the only place we have for imagining new and wild possibilities for a different world. When I go to shows to see other people’s artwork, I’m usually very critical because there is something sacred about art, and I’m very protective of it. I try to remember how hard it is to make work – usually with no money and in your free time – and put it out there.”
• KAPTZON’S ARTWORK: “I’m not a big fan of originality. It’s very rare to come across, and I don’t know if I am one of those. I don’t think I need to do something that has never been done before; the world is already so full of ideas, images, and objects. I try to make my work as authentic and as true to myself as I can. It’s hard enough to find your own, unique voice and use it to say something about the world.

“My art blurs the lines between fiction and reality, mimicking the styles of authoritative forms like academic lectures, documentaries, and historical.”

www.instagram.com/havivk/

Yael Sloma

• Born in 1987
• Lives and works in Jaffa

Yael Sloma is a video artist who explores representations of religious myths through popular music and cinema. Creating videos, video installations, and printmaking, she focuses mainly on woodcut and linocut, mixing traditional and contemporary subjects, techniques, and aesthetics. She merges biblical mythologies with digital images. “I blend up-to-date technology with iconology from the history of art. I explore religious concepts through popular culture, such as music and cinema,” she explains.

Her newest exhibition, “The Shepherd,” showing at the Jaffa Museum, opened last night and will be on view until the end of this month. Comprising six video installations, the artist deals with the intersection between God, faith, and popular music. All six videos are dedicated to one verse from “A Psalm of David” (Psalms, 23).

Sloma graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art and Jerusalem’s Bezalel Academy of Art and Design. Her works have been exhibited at, among other locations, the Almacen Gallery in Jaffa; the 14th Street Y in New York; the Jerusalem Artists’ House; the Museum of Modern Art Shanghai; the Walter-Otero Gallery in Puerto Rico; and the Tel Aviv Cinematheque. Sloma received fellowships from Liebling House, Artist in the City, the Culture and Sport Ministry, and Arts in the Community. She was also the recipient of the Mount Royal Emerging Artist Award and scholarships from the Pais Council for Culture and Art, the Rabinovitch Foundation, the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, and the Maryland Institute College of Art. Her public installations and wall works are in Jaffa and at several locations in Tel Aviv’s Neveh Sha’anan neighborhood.

• INSPIRATION: “Moments of boredom. Standing in line at the supermarket, being stuck in traffic, trying to un-think the pain at the dentist, listening to others’ reels on the bus. Any moment that forces me to be present in the world and to lose my ownership of my time.”
• MEANING OF ART: “Art is anything that a person makes that is not used for their existence or their reproduction. But good art is a revelation – a moment of clarity and enlightenment in which I learn a substantial truth about the world. This truth has many forms: It can be the truth of color and shape; the nature of human beings, or our existence in the world. In any of these, it strikes me with surprise and awe.”
• SLOMA’S ARTWORK: “I have no idea what makes my artwork unique, since I cannot read people’s minds. But I can say that I set extreme conditions for their creation; therefore, my artworks are always Sisyphean to make. For instance, in one work, I set myself the challenge to find all citations of the 23rd Psalm in popular music. In another, I asked a musician to sing for six hours straight, again and again, a melody we created for Psalm 23. Both works are part of my new exhibition, ‘The Shepherd.’”

www.yaelsloma.com

Assaf Hinden

• Born in 1988
• Lives and works in Tel Aviv

Assaf Hinden places photography, installation, and image-based media at the core of his practice. His works confront the construction of images and, therefore, of narratives, testimonies, and interpretations. By revisiting public and private archives, he creates visual dialogues between different times and places, often incorporating backstories and historical events in his works. He examines themes of the source and evolution of art, cultural belonging, and identity while challenging linear structures of time and narratives.

Based in Tel Aviv, he earned his art degrees from The Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp and The Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem. His works are showcased in Israel and at numerous galleries and museums in Europe. Hinden has participated in various artist-in-residence programs, such as the MeetFactory in Prague, the Artist Residency Center in Athens, the Lucy Art Residency (Kavala, Greece), and the Werner Thoni Art Space in Barcelona. He is a recipient of many grants and fellowships, including The Ministry of Culture Young Artist Award (2023), Asylum Arts Grant (NYC, 2022), and ‘The Roger De Conynck Photographer Prize (King Baudouin Foundation, Belgium 2021).

His current exhibition, “Figure of Work” (at Tel Aviv’s Braverman Gallery, on view until July 6), features photography works capturing visitors in various museums worldwide. The series focuses on the physical presence and gestures within the authoritative space that defines cultural and historical mappings of visual knowledge and ideas. Utilizing museums as backdrops, Hinden examines the performative qualities of observing. Moreover, the viewers in the gallery function as potential participants by becoming aware of their presence and role.

• INSPIRATION: “I draw inspiration by revisiting different elements from the past, both collective and biographical (such as family archives). By resurfacing and reconstructing them with the tools I work with, I aim to comment on a temporary present but also to create visual dialogues between times and places. The elements and materials I document or work with revolve around the themes that trigger me to create, like cultural identity and belonging, and inquiries into the evolution, origin, and ownership of art. I’m also inspired by examining tension and co-dependence between space, art, viewer, and artist – and how the fluid and unbounded nature of something like art interacts with institutional frameworks and boundaries.”
• MEANING OF ART: “Anything that is referred to as art or created in that context is considered as such, though my current definition mainly resonates with the term ‘activation’: everything that activates spaces, time, and people. It’s a form of expression but also a tool that activates various aspects of human experience and thought processes, physical presence, and attention. It can be any intervention that interacts with our senses and bodies, feelings or memories, that raises cultural, historical, and critical reflections. It can also simply be defined as a dialogue between a creator and a viewer or between materials and forms that interact with each other beyond an immediate response.”
• HINDEN’S ARTWORK:“I believe that my approach isn’t bound by a fixed visual method. Each body of work requires its own terms and conditions rather than conforming to a predetermined approach or style. My initial inspiration, motivation, and research shape how the work visually and formally engages the viewer, while time also plays a crucial role in its realization. I also find the production phase to be integral, particularly when working with image-based media like photography. These decisions are usually guided by an inner sense of logic and intuitive responses to the creative process, but it’s essential for me to evaluate this stage and determine the visual elements that enhance the interaction of the work with the viewer.” 

www.assafhinden.com/