Maternal element – the unmothered

As with all artworks, A Way to Remember is informed by one’s own experiences. Spreading the mixture on the paper opened up an imaginary space where a domestic action of floor cleaning has been echoed, of a woman standing on four, rubbing her hands over a flat surface, as if cleaning or whipping some dirt. This was reinforced by the colour of the mixture which resembles dirt.

Regarding women who were not mothered psychoanalyst Clarisa Pinkola Estes writes: ‘[...] if she is unmothered, her instincts have not been sharpened.’[1] A person who’s basic instinct has been injured ‘instead of aiming toward new life, [...] sits down in a psychic pool of glue. Lack of fleeing when it is absolutely warranted causes depression.’[2] This was written as part of the research, where maternal trauma was explored and analysed. Indeed, this new work, although addressing a Palestinian town which got destroyed in 1948, was done through the artist’s own personal biography.

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[1] Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Women Who Run With The Wolves, London: Rider,1998, p. 186

[2] Ibid, p. 231

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A Way to Remember, Drawing, was a pavement art commission which took place as part of MK Festival Fringe 2012[1]. In respond to the brief the following proposal had been put forward.

I would like to draw the Palestinian town 'Samakh' which got destroyed in 1948 with the 'birth' of Israel as my ‘Objet Trouve’ (Found Object). As an Israeli artist (based in Winchester, UK) I am interested in Palestinian towns and villages that existed until 1948.  History lessons at school excluded this information, so now, as an adult, as a mother-artist I am re-educating myself and some others too. I lived in MK for six years, and both my sons were born there.  

With regard to Oskar Schlemmer's quote, I refer to the definition of 'romantic' as:

'relating to a movement in late 18th- and early 19th-century music, literature, and art that departed from classicism and emphasized sensibility, the free expression of feelings, nature, and interest in other cultures'

From: Encarta Dictionary UK.

Some preparation drawings where made prior to the event, where different materials, techniques and compositions were tested. Finally method, form and composition, as well as materials were chosen. The method involved building a layer of Graphite powder mixed with plastic glue to create the effect of ‘road’ or a ‘car park’, on top of which a ‘drawing’ was made, using white chalk. (I put the word ‘drawing’ in bracket because the whole drawing includes the layers and the work with chalk).  This allowed the drawing to look like it was drawn on pavement. The ‘house’ was simplified to a 3-D box-like shape formed by creating straight lines and angles, using Masking tape. This was a performative drawing in which preparing the surface was part of the work and done as a ritual. It included covering the paper with a layer of white emulsion, waiting for it to dry, then start to mix the Graphite powder with plastic glue, using special bowls and a mixing stick. When the mixture was ready, it was spread over the paper by fingers.

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[1] ‘Objet Trove’ MKFestival Fringe (Milton Keynes)

Kristeva writes: ‘Abjection preserves what existed in the archaism of pre-objectal relationship, in the immemorial violence with which the body becomes separated from another body in order to be [...].’[1]

Abjection, therefore, can be understood as a psychical container of memory. Such a container requires constant attention, movement, and dialogue with other containers. As such, it is utilised as a base on which my practice is formed.

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[1] J. Kristeva, Power of Horrors: An Essay in Abjection, Columbia University Press New York, 1982, pp. 9-10.

The act of collecting data is a performative act, in which ima becomes a ‘curious tourist’, a ‘detective’, a ‘journalist’ or any other identity as needed at the time. This already enables an active reflection at an early stage of the research. When I collect data, the data ‘collects’ me, in other words, action that is done with an enhanced awareness has the potential to affect me. Enhanced awareness is achieved by creating an intervention and an interruption which are part of the method of ima.

Emulsion is used in my works. It is a link to the following memory. Palestinian decorators had been employed by the kibbutz and occasionally gave me some emulsion for my paintings.

Laura U. Marks asks: ‘Where meaningful knowledge is located?’ It is between cultures, therefore ‘can never be fully verified in the terms of one regime or the other.’[1] Amongst alternative ways to express and produce knowledge, according to Marks, is ‘the very lack of images or memories, itself a meaningful record of what can be expressed.’[2] These quotations are relevant in the context of the invisible presence of the Palestinians and their suffering in my childhood landscape. This childhood was a Palestinian-free zone. One makes a special effort to increase awareness of the ‘other’ (Palestinian) invisibility.

Here, memory was used in bringing material from the past – emulsion - to the present. The past is therefore revisited from the point of consciousness of the present, through materiality. This echoes Foucault’s quotation of Kant’s philosophical question: ‘What are we?’[3] While the Cartesian question: Who are we? implies a universal subject, according to Foucault:

‘Kant’s question appears as an analysis of both us and our present [...] Maybe the most certain of all philosophical problems is the problem of the present time and of what we are in this very moment. Maybe the target nowadays is not to discover what we are but to refuse what we are. We have to imagine and to built up what we could be to get rid of this kind of political “double bind,” which is the simultaneous individualization and totalization of modern power structures.’[4]

This act of revisiting the past is enabled through materiality and imagination. In that sense, through the art work we ‘build up what we could be.’[5]  

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[1] Laura U. Marks, The Skin of The Film, Intercultural Cinema, Embodiment, and the Senses, 2000,

p. 24.

[2] Ibid, p.24.

[3] Michel Foucault, ‘The Subject and Power’ in Brian Wallis (ed.), Art After Modernism: Rethinking Representation, 1996, p. 423.

[4] Ibid, pp. 423-424.

[5] Ibid, p. 424.

A link to YNG's research: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/165505/1.hasCoversheetVersion/Final_version_of_Doctorate_with_appendices_April_29.pdf

Here  is a link to Yonat Nitzan-Green's book: http://www.bod.com/index.php?id=3435&objk_id=407999