Adi Nes's first exhibition in the UK opens at the Jewish Museum in London on Thursday, October 11. Called The Village, it is a series of large-scale images set in an imagined rural community which seek to capture some of the fault-lines running through Israeli society.
“When I created The Village I thought to create an image like a dream,” explains Nes, one of his country's most acclaimed photographers. “In many ways dreams are fantastic and pastoral but also full of fears and all the things that we deny.”
He describes The Village as a metaphor for Israel, “a small place that was built after a tragedy”. There is an external beauty but at the same time “under the surface there is something dark and not quiet”. Certainly a sense of unease runs through the series. Nes adds that the work aims to address “the tensions between the centre and the periphery, ethnic issues such as Sephardim and Ashkenazim', as well intergenerational relationships.
The exhibition runs at the Jewish Museum, London NW1, until February 3 2013. Nes will be in conversation with Mark Nash of the Royal College of Art at the opening on Thursday, at 7.30pm. Tickets on 020 7284 7384 or visit www.jewishmuseum.org.uk
