Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, Oil and charcoal on plywood, 60 x 90 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, oil and charcoal on plywood, 85 x 244 cm, private collection, Israel, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, oil and charcoal on plywood, 96 x 151 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2002, oil and charcoal on plywood, 80 x 80 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2000, oil and charcoal on plywood, 75 x 50, courtesy of the artist and Ha' Kibbutz Israeli Art Gallery, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, oil and charcoal on plywood, 173 x 58 cm, courtesy of the Atad Family Collection, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2002, oil and charcoal on plywood, 78 x 120 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, oil and charcoal on plywood, 72 x 40 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Untitled, from the installation "Behind the Fence", 2003 (installation view), fiberglass, polyester and pigment, 170 x 45 x 80 cm, courtesy of the collection of Nira Itzhaki and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary art, Tel Aviv
Untitled, from the series "Ambition", 2001, Oil and charcoal on plywood, 60 x 90 cm, courtesy of the artist and Chelouche Gallery for Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, photo: Hilit Kadouri
Nadav Weissman
The human creatures that inhabit Nadav Weissman's paintings seem to have been taken from animation films, caricatures or comic strips as if playing some absurd, pointless game. Despite the strong, naïve pinks, yellows and blues, the scenes exude a sense of melancholy, restlessness, alienation, desperation and compulsivity. The bittersweet narratives remaine vague, paradoxical descriptions of the human condition. Almost all of the characteristics of the grotesque are featured here: the figures' proportions are distorted and exaggerated - huge, fetus-like heads on shriveled, pinkish alien-like naked bodies; game elements combine children's toys with an adult, anxiety-ridden and humorous consciousness; established orders are unraveled in the combination of childish and adult bodies; and finally, corporeality in all its abject aspects, sexual organs and excrement. The scene's allegorical and symbolical power lies in the way Weissman's personal mythology is presented to the viewer as a parable of an existential nightmare and an ongoing negotiation with the inevitability of suffering.
