Tel Aviv Museum of Art


Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Tel Aviv, Israel.
"Soft Worlds" Exhibition. 

"City Growth", Interactive Painting, "Worn Again" Dress and Recycling process ,2018.
Recycled Textile, Knits, Buttons on Canvas.

Mar 18, 2018 - End of Summer 2018.

Dana Cohen's work is concerned with the overtaking and marginalization of agricultural plots by processes of urbanization. As the daughter of a farmer who experienced this process firsthand, she has become especially sensitive to this issue. Having worked as a decoder of aerial photographs during her military service, she makes use of aerial photographs that reveal the changes on the ground. The top part of her work simulates a bird's eye view that resembles an abstract painting made of knit textile, which she combines with the recycled felt in the bottom part of the work. Cohen has developed a work process that evolves several stages. She gathers old knits, classifies them by color, and has them shredded. She then transforms the soft material into felt, which she uses to sew items of clothing that reflect the recycling process, as is made evident by the example on display. Inspired by these sets of clothing, Cohen has created a soft "painting" made of felt, which she then cut into diamond-shaped forms. The arrangement of these forms, which are attached to the canvas by means of buttons, resembles the arrangement of a gradually composed puzzle. In this instance, however, the arrangement is arbitrary, and is recreated by the visitors as they constantly rearrange the forms. The colorful image, which changes from one moment to the next, sometimes momentarily calls to mind the compositions created by Jackson Pollock, who would randomly splash paint on a canvas spread on the floor.