לנדקוויסט

In the exhibition “Lundqvist” Naama Mokady creates a performative documentary space that is both personal and biographical, while echoing the exposed nerve of Israeli society, touching on bereavement. The web of pain she weaves and unravels creates an intergenerational tension between fathers and sons, and between daughters and fathers, existing in a liminal space of ongoing trauma where every day is Memorial Day. Sometimes the artist is the mother and sometimes the daughter; her heartbreaking gaze at her father creates moments of sadness, humor, discomfort and compassion. Their relationship is also examined through conventions of photography, video and documentary cinema. Handing the camera to the father, who asked to document the process, is also a way to make space and visibility for the dimension of lack of control, which exists in the constant search for healing and in the yearning for a present father figure.

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Mokady’s father lost his father in the Six-Day War when he was a year and a half old, but no one spoke about Dad at home. Her father was a fighter pilot who established an airfield and a skydiving club after his service. About two years ago, her father, whom Mokady describes as rigid and reserved, experienced a major crisis and began a kind of emotional and spiritual journey that exposed him and his vulnerability. These artworks hint at the father’s journey through his enigmatic figure, but it is not fully decoded. The journey experienced by father and daughter as they document each other and themselves deconstructs clichés of Israeli masculinity and fatherhood.

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According to Mokady’s father, the exhibition’s title, “Lundqvist,” is a mantra that came down from heaven and helped him overcome physical and emotional difficulties during flight school training. In retrospect, he discovered it was the name of a person who was the commander of the Finnish Air Force and died weeks before Mokady’s father himself was born.

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The central video work in the exhibition interweaves Mokady’s and her father’s perspectives. Most were filmed around last year’s Memorial Day events and some during an earlier one. In another work, a sound piece on a children’s chair, listeners are invited to listen to a body scan meditation in Mokady’s father’s voice. In a third work, an ultrasound image of the artist’s womb is projected.

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In the fourth work, documentation of a performance created by Mokady at the Ein Hod Contemporary Art Gallery is projected, featuring paintings by Moshe Mokady, the artist’s great-grandfather. The work’s title — “Disconnecting” — is a term taken from the Air Force flight terminology. “To disconnect”, the artist explains, means to leave the area, disengage from the enemy, and return home. According to her, the work also deals with the attempt at independent self-definition that does not depend on the men in her life.

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The works in the exhibition draw parallels between the constant role exchanges between mother and daughter, father and son, like a journey to exorcise demons of a child who remained trapped at the point in time at which he lost his father, and of a woman-child who yearns for the present-absent father figure, while simultaneously wanting to release it and become a mother to her own child.

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Lundqvist | Photography: Naama Mokady, Dan Mokady, Ori Kuper | Sound consulting: Amir Bolzman | Mix: Daniel Koronkevich | Video consultation: Oleg Alon M. | "Lundqvist": English subtitles: Gil Godinger.

Thanks to Lea Mauas, Maayan Sheleff, Zeela Kotler Hadari, and The New Gallery Artists' Studios Teddy.

Tanks to my family, my Father Dan and my grandfather Rafi. 

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Mamuta Art and Research Center | Artistic Director: Lea Mauas | Project Manager: Naama Mokady | Exhibition Space Coordinator: Gil Godinger | Installation: Itamar Mevorach | Hebrew Editing: Ronit Rosenthal | Arabic Translation: Anwar Ben Badis | English Editing: Judith Appleton | Graphic Design: Maya Shleifer.

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The exhibition is supported by the Jerusalem Municipality and the Ministry of Culture