2011 - 2022: Legacy +
Yonatan Ullman’s installation LEGACY
raises questions about identity, placement, sacrifice and lineage.
His work on it began just before he left from living in New York
in order to move back to his home country of Israel.
Thus, transition, uncertainty and questions about his identity
were already infused into it.
Before leaving, rather than rip through layers of paint as he had done in his project ‘FORCE’,
Ullman completely ripped the walls of his New York studio.
These became the floor for this installation.
Thus, this component of this work contains his studio walls -
the equivalent of an empty canvas for a painter - a fertile breeding ground where anything can be created.
Except, this ‘empty canvas’ is already broken and shattered.
In this state it calls to mind a barren wasteland rather than fertile ground.
Collapsing the walls of his studio also metaphorically erased the distinction
between the ‘outside of his studio’ and the ‘inside of his studio’.
Thus outside influence infiltrated his mental space - namely icons from art history -
And what better icon to start with than Michealgelo’s ‘David’ -
both an icon of art history, and a figure who is central to Jewish identity.
Ullman ordered a replica of his bust from ebay,
then painted over that replica in layers of red then layers of white,
and eventually peeled parts of the white layer off
in order to expose underneath it what appears as lucious red flesh.
Since then this installation exhibited multiple times, in multiple locations:
New York, Miami, Tel Aviv and Ein Shemer.
The statue of Liberty, Moshe Gershuni, a memorial to a fallen hero -
with each iteration, this installation absorbed influences from the specific location where it was shown.
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