The Dream of Panotti 1

In his textile works the Israeli artist Gili Avissar uses weaving, knotting and patchwork techniques to (re)combine his mostly recycled working materials. He creates space-consuming installations with his richly coloured combinations and structures suggestive of cell growth or neuronal networks. In Avissar’s outdoor interventions, created on location, he generates close connections and relationships between material and nature. This is true also of the work specially developed for Blickachsen 13, which hangs stretched out beneath a canopy of leaves in an avenue of trees in the Schlosspark: with its threads, interweavings and knots, “The Dream of Panotti” captures the organic growth of its surroundings and answers it with an exuberant combination of colours and lines. With his ‘dream of the Panotti’ the artist furthermore invokes a mythical people, which he also thematizes in his moving performances: the ear people, who – as Pliny the Elder describes – could wrap themselves up as if in a blanket with their huge ears.
Gili Avissar initially wanted to study fashion design, but then decided to study fine art in Jerusalem, Glasgow and Tel Aviv, combining painting, sculpture, performance and dance in his multifarious work.