Flora & Fauna | Gow Langsford Gallery
Gow Langsford Gallery, Auckland, New Zealand, is thrilled to present Flora & Fauna, a selection of artworks by London-based artist Zadok Ben-David.
The intricately painted stainless steel artworks presented in Flora & Fauna provide a compelling view of the artist's practice, showcasing the technical and conceptual finesse that has underpinned his global success. Flora & Fauna is Ben-David's first exhibition in New Zealand since he participated in the group exhibition 'Roundabout' at Gallery Wellington in 2010.
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https://gowlangsfordgallery.co.nz/exhibitions/333-flora-fauna-zadok-ben-david/
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February, 14 2024
New Horizon: Vision of the Future | Arts Maebashi Museum
Arts Maebashi in Maebashi City, Japan, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year after opening in October 2013 as a public art museum in a renovated commercial facility located in downtown Maebashi.
Since its opening, the museum has showcased many local art projects as well as exhibitions based on the three concepts of "being creative," "sharing with others," and "being interactive."
This exhibition, "New Horizon: Vision of the Future," commemorates the museum's 10th anniversary and will further expand the collaboration between citizens and artists based at Arts Maebashi to the urban area. It will display works using artificial intelligence, augmented reality (AR), and other technologies in the arcade area,, and in surrounding contemporary buildings developed through urban design in partnership with the public and private sectors.
The project will also expand its activities to the city center and will include immersive video installations and works from the residency programs of young artists who will lead the next generation. In anticipation for the "next 10 years" of Arts Maebashi, this exhibition will open up new possibilities for art and museums in an ever-changing city.
As part of this exsiting group show Zadok Ben-David presents us with 'People I Saw But Never Met'. Within it are approximately 6,000 human figures cut out from metal and arranged on sand.
The people are diverse in size, gender, nationality, appearance, and clothing. One could say that the work is a true depiction of human society in the present age.
This modern and diverse society once dreamed of world peace and prosperity amid the backdrop of globalism. But with wars, global warming, and anxiety over AI, blockchains, and other new technologies, it is no longer optimistic. Nevertheless, Ben-David presents us with a beautiful and diverse image of human society.
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https://www.artsmaebashi.jp/en/?p=4482
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October, 14 2023
The Love of Art Comes First. Art & Project | Kröller-Müller Museum
The exhibition The Love of Art Comes First. Art & Project at the Kröller-Müller Museum is an exhibition created in close collaboration with the RKD Netherlands Institute for Art History in The Hague.
Exactly ten years ago, the Kröller-Müller received over 300 works of art donated by Geert van Beijeren and Adriaan van Ravesteijn, who assembled an impressive art collection of over 800 works as an extension of their gallery activities.
They named that collection Art & Project / Depot VBVR, after the initials of their names. Over the years, after the gallery closed, they divided up this collection and donated works to the Rijksmuseum Twenthe in Enschede, the Kunstmuseum in The Hague, the Kröller-Müller Museum, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam and the MoMA in New York. The gallery's archive went to the RKD in The Hague, as did a large collection of artists' books that Van Beijeren and Van Ravesteijn had collected.
Zadok Ben-David's sculpture 'The Bright Reincarnation of the Antilope' is on display alongside many artworks from the Depot VBVR collection. The exhibition also includes artworks that were acquired by the museum from Art & Project or purchased there by other collectors, who later donated them to the Kröller-Müller. All 100 artworks are in some way related to the legendary Art & Project.
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Seoptember, 30 2023
Nascosti Alla Luce Del Sole + Natural Reserve | Nashira Gallery
Zadok Ben-David is first taking part in a group show before showing solo at Nashira Gallery in Milan, Italy.
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The group show “Nascosti Alla Luce Del Sole” ("Hidden in the sunlight") will feature participating artists; Ako Atikossie, Zadok Ben-David, Alik Cava-liere, Maria Positano, Emanuele Resce, and Sebastian Thomas.
The exhibited work by Ben-David presents two faces and two viewpoints.
The work is inspired by the sculptor’s experience during a folk gathering at Quito in Ecuador, where he saw a man wearing one of the traditional indigenous garments: Aya Uma, the representation of a devil. A figure representing the world and the universe in the Andean community, seen as the coming together of all opposites, north and south, husband and wife, light and dark, sun and moon.
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Ben-David's solo show at Nashira Gallery, which begins in November, is 'Natural Reserve".
Man owes so much to plants but often forgets them, not considering that they too are living things that are born and die. The Botanic Gardens Conservation International estimates that 30 percent of the existing plant species on the planet today are at risk of extinction due to various causes: climate change, overexploitation, and change in their habitat.
Zadok Ben-David has for years been pursuing an artistic quest that promotes a message of return to a state of coexistence in harmony and respect not only with plants but with all living beings and peoples on the planet. It is therefore with pride that Nashira Gallery is showing the large-scale installation Blackfield (2007-2021) along side many other sculptures and video artworks.
Ben-David's work is as succinct as it is effective a representation of the opposition between life and death that leads the viewer to reflect on their own emotions and transience.
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https://www.nashiragallery.com/en/featured_item/natural-reserve_eng/
Seoptember, 21 2023
Natural Reserve | Annandale Galleries
Zadok Ben-David’s first solo at Annandale in Perth, Australia, since 2016 features sculptures, drawings, and videos which ‘entred on themes of tragedy and hope, shining a light on the relationship between humanity and the natural world.
“For Ben-David, it’s important that a work projects an initial sense of wonder. Our first feelings when we stand in front of a large installation, are ones of astonishment. The next sensation is pure delight, but this paradise is quickly lost, or at least thrown into question.”
- John McDonald for Natural Reserve exhibition catalogue.
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March, 22 2023
People I Saw But Never Met | Centro Cultural Itchimbia
Zadok Ben-David's first exhibition in Ecuador at the incredible Centro Cultural Itchimbia. This is the largest version of this installation to date including 141 aluminium sculptures and over 6,500 stainless steel miniatures.
Since beginning work on this installation in 2015, the reading of its meaning has shifted with each exhibition in line with its location and cultural context.
Historically, and up to the present day, Ecuador is a noted hub for migration, People I Saw But Never Met is therefore particularly salient as a metaphor for the world's diversity and population. Altogether there are thousands of human figures representative of the plurality of ethnicities, languages, traditions, cultures and religions inhabiting our planet.
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https://quitocultura.com/team-member/centro-cultura-itchimbia/
September, 24 2022
The Forest Through The Trees | Laumeier Sculpture Park
Forest Through the Trees at Laumeier Sculpture Park, Missouri USA, presents a selection of artists whose observations range from figurative representation to conceptual experimentation where the tree is treated as both the individual subject and a collective of multiple objects.
Trees have long inspired artists and writers with their majestic power and natural beauty. This exhibition takes another look at this familiar subject matter. As a park and a collecting institution, Laumeier has previously explored a myriad of concepts around sculpture and nature. This exhibition asks visitors to look at the Park and their environment differently, pointing directly to the physical relationship and conversation created between the audience, the artworks, and the trees that populate this landscape.
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https://www.laumeiersculpturepark.org/forest-through-the-trees
August, 27 2022
Bienal de Arte de Cerveira | Vila Nova de Cerveira
Zadok Ben David contributes to this latest edition of the oldest Biennale in the Iberian Peninsula, (Vila Nova de Cerveira, Portugal) sending his monumental Corten Steel sculpture 'Girl on the Run'.
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A message from the President of the Biennale:
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History is made with the will, determination, intelligence and dreams of men.
With his actions over time and here, specifically, with forty-four years of valuing a unique territory and affirming Vila Nova de Cerveira as the “Vila das Artes”, a project built based on the desire to democratize the Art.
I believe that in “Vila das Artes” it is essential to raise awareness and instill in the population the value of all this cultural heritage and go even further. It is urgent to meet people and bring art to everyone, without exception. Show the power of art to change the world, to open a new renaissance, a new renaissance. Thus abandoning some entropy and passivity. It is not enough to keep up with the evolution of times and society. We have an obligation to be at the forefront of all this.
This edition will be carried out in a hybrid model, thus allowing us to reach more audiences and unite more voices around this project to value Contemporary Art as a way of thinking about the world.
We all “must act” now! Thank you for joining us, it is also part of our common project.
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July, 16 2022
Shrubs, Flowers and Decay | Galerie Albrecht
Shrubs, Flowers and Decay shows two artists whose work explores similar themes in very different ways.
Zadok is presenting several, never before seen, hand-painted flowers in mirrored boxes alongside photography by Tilyen Mucik.
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The show runs at Galerie Albrecht in Berlin until 19th May 2022.
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https://www.galeriesusannealbrecht.de/shrubs-flowers-abd-decay/
March, 25 2022
From Here and There | Sotheby's Israel
The works on display are part of the artist’s grand body of work People I Saw but Never Met which to date includes more than 6,000 chemically acid-etched stainless steel miniature figures and 200 large hand-cut aluminum figures. It features figures of people seen over the past 6 years by the artist throughout his travels across the globe, however without personally meeting them.
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https://www.sothebys.com/en/about/locations/tel-aviv
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September, 03 2021
Natural Reserve | Kew Gardens
Natural Reserve is Zadok Ben-David's first UK-based solo exhibition to incorporate new and existing works by the artist since 2008.
The exhibition centers on themes of tragedy and hope, as well as shining a uniquely creative light on the relationship between humanity and the natural world.
Brand new and extended artworks are featured, including the stunning 360-degree installation Blackfield which is made up of more than 17,000 etched, hand-painted flowers.
Receiving sustained critical and public acclaim in over 20 countries worldwide, Blackfield is being displayed for the first time in the UK as the centerpiece of Natural Reserve.
The immersive  floor installation contains stainless steel flowers all assembled by hand. These tiny floral motifs are based on illustrations from 19th century Victorian encyclopedias.
Blackfield is a breath-taking piece that provides a unique opportunity to experience Zadok’s unique vision of nature and reflect on the contrasts between life and death.
https://www.kew.org/kew-gardens/whats-on/zadok-ben-david-natural-reserve
October, 16 2021
People I Saw But Never Met at Tel Aviv Museum of Art
New solo show of Zadok Ben-David at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art in Israel. This is the largest installation to date including 110 aluminium sculptures and over 6,000 stainless steel miniatures. Ben-David began working on the installation in 2015, adding more and more figures with each passing month as the work itself continued to grow. But it isn’t only its scale that changed over time. So, too, has the reading of this installation. The past year, marked by a global pandemic, has lent the work a new and unexpected meaning: a kind of heightened sensitivity in us, the viewers, to the idea of social gathering. At a time when movement across countries and borders has grinded to a halt, something in the measured distance between these figures appears almost prescient—a foreshadowing of our new routine of social distancing.
https://www.tamuseum.org.il/en/exhibition/zadok-ben-david-people-i-saw-never-me/