Erez Aharon

According to legend, the Jews, who were exiled from their homeland and live as adaptive strangers everywhere, carry the punishment of Cain in their wanderings. In the Middle Ages, this myth was reinforced with a false anecdote about a Jewish man who harassed Jesus on the way to Calvary, and Jesus in turn cursed him to eternal wandering. Either way, such are the Jews: they are strangers wherever they go.

The Wandering Jew plant likely got its name due to its adaptability and the nomadic qualities associated with it. A simple plant thriving on the margins, growing wild on traffic islands and along neglected fences, and at the same time—it has a majestic prestige about it, manifested in the vivid purple color of its leaves.

Erez Aharon's paintings isolate these leaves, turning them into a laboratory specimen, and placing them on a neutral background under optimal lighting. They are "realistic" yet behave almost like an abstract painting, with a single purple-green stain in the heart of a bright, empty surface. Their shadow reminds us that we are concerned with three-dimensional space and that there is volume and illusion here.

Realistic painting from observation, introducing subtle metaphors for the Israeli reality—an olive leaf hanging by a thread, a rootless flower attached to the wall, etc.—is Aharon's hallmark. A graduate of the Midrasha School of Art at Beit Berl Academic College and a former student of Israel Hershberg at the Jerusalem Studio School, in his works Aharon combines the idea of art as a meditative, exercise-like, silent observation and the view of art as a response to reality.

Aharon began working on his Wandering Jew series in 2022 when the anti-democratic judicial coup and the protests against it broke out in Israel. Then, he painted the plants hanging on a thin, red string - a Kabbalistic symbol of protection. Then, in October 2023, the massacre in Otef Aza and the Gaza War that followed led him to paint them hung even more precariously, on a small piece of tape - reflecting the instability of current reality.

Erez Aharon (b. 1974) lives in Rishon LeTsiyon and works in Tel Aviv, Israel. Aharon studied at the Midrasha School of Art, at Beit Berl Academic College, under artist Israel Hershberg at the Jerusalem Studio School, and under Aram Gershuni at Hatahana Studio for figurative arts.