The Wednesday Lecture Wednesday 17th March 2021
Artist: Batsheva Ross Willow Fisher
The name of this Wednesday guest lecture was Batsheva Ross, an artist originally from Jerusalem but currently in practice in Brussels. Prior to this session I had not heard of this artist or came across any of her work before, but afterwards I found myself researching more into her and independently looking at the imagery she has created to deepen my understanding of her. I also proceeded to follow the artist on social media. Overall I found that I really enjoyed this lecture, the layout and length of it wasn’t daunting or overwhelming which I find some of the lectures can be. She provided us as her audience with appropriate images of her artwork and exhibitions she has involved herself in to go alongside the information she is telling us about herself. I find that when a speaker composes the lecture this way I can engage myself in it easier and relay the information back, it also just makes it more interesting if you can see the work the artist is talking about in the context it is intended to be in. What stood out to me in particular was her off hand comment about her finding it difficult to photograph a certain series of her paintings as they are framed and she kept getting reflections in the transparent surface. I like this because she is talking about her work realistically and the way she is approaching presenting her work is relatable. I think the positive manner of her speaking helped me to engage with this session too, so not only did I find the lecture enjoyable but I also found interest in the speaker. I think this really affects how the presentation comes across depending on how the speaker language and attitude. Ross was really engaging and passionate about the artwork she was talking about, presenting at a pace suitable to sit through and take in the information.
Ross explained to begin with that she has been exhibiting since 2005, and that her artistic interests range from drawing, painting, creating stuffed fabric sculptures and working with nylon threads. Influencing her for many of her concepts are spiritual authorities, prophecies and telekinetic abilities. A body of work that I felt fascinated by is called “Reproduction” and she produced this work when she was an art student in 2001. During this time she reflected on how she began to involve her heritage into her work, painting her personal history. In doing so she found that religion became a focalisation for influencing her artistic ideas and began to reference the Bible and religious sacred texts in her creations. For her she identified art as being a substitute for religion within her life. Another series of work that I found compelling that she made for her first solo show were her paintings of Rabbis’. She orchestrated herself to paint a well known iconic Rabbi, inspired by her mother as she initially painted a Rabbi portrait and gave it to her, so from this she produced a series of Rabbi paintings. What appeals to her is tradition, and incorporating tradition into the context of an art gallery depicting these Rabbis. Ross painted from various examples of documentation and famous photographs, when talking about referencing the photos she outlined the experience during a photograph, for example detailing the tension between the photographer and the subject. She goes on to describe the tone, implying that when the subjects are photographed it is actually a personal and intimate moment, and that the sitter acts narcissistically because the camera and audience are solely looking at them. Ross frequently thought about this interpretation during the production of her painting series, she mostly occupied herself with wanting to convey what was going through the mind of the Rabbi. This ideology interests me greatly because not only in the artist concerning herself with depicting the subject but she is also considering the reflective nature she can bring into her interpretation, capturing the interior and exterior of the subject.
Regarding her interest in working with more practical materials like fabric and stuffed sculptures, she presented to us an installation piece she concocted called “Dirty Mind” The conceptual piece saw a flock of brooms encased in wax floating in a bundle. When describing her work’s appearance she compared the action to an abundance of moths bundling to a light. The artist proceeds to talk about her striking fascination with the movement of air, more specifically the movement of objects in the air. Another piece of work that she introduced to us was called “Fool of Dreams”. I can see similarities between this piece and the installation prior to this, in that Ross has managed to harness the energy present through the natural course of movement. It looks almost fragile yet rigid at the same time in their spiral like formation descending to the surface.
To conclude I found this Wednesday guest lecture quite gratifying. I did not ask any questions to Ross but if I were to then I perhaps would have asked for more details of the creative process of her installation pieces “Dirty Mind” and “Fool of Dreams”. If not in documentation then verbally I would have liked to know how exactly she constructed the pieces to withstand their own weight and appear light in its volume.
