Creative Encounters

 

Düsseldorf and Ein Hod are linked by a unique partnership stretching back 30 years. An exhibition pays homage to the jubilee.

 

The Israeli artists’ village Ein Hod is located in the middle of the Mount Carmel range. The idyllic village has a population of less than 600, and that includes children. It is also home to a small house that awaits visits by painters, illustrators and sculptors from Düsseldorf, “where by contrast some 1,600 artists live,” comments Margol Guttman, who anchors the Israeli end of the exchange programme. Conversely, Israeli artists from Ein Hod can whenever they like make use of the guest studio in Düsseldorf, financed by the City Council. The collaboration is now almost 30 years old.

An exhibition in Düsseldorf from 25 February thru 15 March 2015 highlights the jubilee. On show will be works amongst others by Roni Ben-Zvi, Batia Eisenwasser-Jancourt, Gideon Sella, Batia Wang and Lilach Peled-Charny from Israel. The German side will be represented by pieces by Franz Karl Bößer (deceased) as well as by Nadja Nafe and Ute Reeh. Guttman, who organises the exchange on a voluntary basis, will accompany multimedia artist Avraham Eilat to Düsseldorf. Along with photographer Boaz Tal and sculptor and painter Shoshana Hieman, Eilat is one of the best known Israeli artists to have taken part in the programme to date.

 

Originally, the artist exchange programme was meant to be between Haifa and Düsseldorf. The two have been twinned cities since 1988, “but there were no real facilities in Haifa,” Guttman reports, “so we jumped in and stopped the gap.” A total of 250 artists have since availed themselves of the opportunity to spend two months in the respective other country and then exhibit their works. “Some of the artists have actually taken part more than once,” Guttman narrates. Moreover, each year Guttman encourages an Israeli artist who does not live in Ein Hod to travel to Düsseldorf – an apartment, a studio and exhibition spaces await them there free of charge.

 

While Düsseldorf already collaborates with 30 different countries the world over, for Ein Hod it is the only international exchange programme to date, with links currently being established to Russia and France. For many artists, the exchange with Germany does not come naturally, Guttman professes. “I still often almost faint if someone standing next to me suddenly shouts ‘Achtung’.” That said, the bridge built between German and Israeli artists has long since “become much more than just a matter of arriving, doing some work and then leaving again.” Often the hosts and visitors find themselves sitting till the early hours discussing things, including politics. “The works that are made in Israel,” Guttman states, “are often clearly influenced by what is happening here.”