Exhibitions

On Friday January 19, 2024, "Japanese sushi girls" (Kaori, Naomi A., Yuri, Mami Ari and Naomi S.) gathered to prepare sushi for the soldiers at the front. For two hours, they put rice on seaweed, peeled avocado, added carrot, omelet, and cucumber, rolled seaweed, and cut it. One packs it and another writes greetings to the soldiers. The act is not intended to satisfy the hungry but to pamper them, to provide food that they are skilled in preparing, and which they usually prepare for their families. While preparing the sushi, there was a harmony and order among them that charmed me. The coordinated actions, the delicate acrobatics of fingers moving gracefully on seaweed, and the understanding that prevailed between them in silence, laughter, and talk, were beautiful to me, as were the ironed aprons and the Japanese handkerchiefs they wore on their heads. Six women, six life stories full of decisions, fears and hopes. Among the decisions is the decision to live in Israel, far from their parents, their families, their people, and their country. They decided to tie their fate to the fate of my people and show solidarity at this difficult and complex time. Their actions draw together a thread of grace, kindness, and magic.

At the age of 17, Michael Sela (born 1998) decided to become the best photographer in the world. Equipped with a Pentax film camera his father gave him, he embarks on a journey for the sole purpose of photography. This journey also takes place in Japan (2019), which becomes his home. Sela's photographs express sentimental and magical emotions at the same time. His photographs are a means of connecting with a different, distant Japanese reality, but which are also very intimate. He knows most of the people he photographs, and for him photography is capturing small moments in their midst. The people closest to him are photographed in a given space, because a photograph is a sliver of space as it is a sliver of time.

"Japanese Design Today "100” was first developed in 2004 and then toured the world for the following decade. Now we present the third edition of the exhibition, which again brings together superlative examples of Japanese design from a present-day perspective. The exhibition is organized according to thirteen categories among them - furniture, electronics, health, communication, daily life, tableware and cooking, transportation, architecture. The exhibition includes approximately 100 items, most of which are products released after 2000, but it also includes several masterpieces from earlier times in which we can trace the roots of contemporary Japanese design. From objects such as consumer products to intangible systems and services, the designs we use in our daily lives speak volumes about the evolution of our lifestyles and society.