An Exhibition in Tel Aviv Explores Memory After October 7
In Tel Aviv, a new exhibition explores how the events of October 7 and the war that followed have transformed individual and collective memory. What Remains and What Has Dissolved brings together 18 artists at Bifnocho.
How do we remember an event we experienced ourselves, as well as thousands of images we have been exposed to without directly experiencing them? Nearly three years after the tragedy, this question lies at the heart of the group exhibition. What traces have these events left in our consciousness? The exhibition explores the sometimes difficult-to-define boundary between personal and collective memory, between direct experience and images that have become so familiar that they are eventually absorbed into our own inner narratives.
The events of October 7 and the war that followed have profoundly affected Israeli society, through experiences of violence, loss, displacement, uncertainty, and upheaval that have touched different generations to varying degrees. Over time, however, another phenomenon has emerged: the transformation of memory itself.
Some details remain extraordinarily vivid, while others fade. Faces, places, and scenes may gradually lose their clarity. Conversely, images repeatedly encountered in the media or on social networks can become so deeply embedded in our memory that they begin to feel as though we experienced them personally.
It is precisely this uncertain space that the exhibition seeks to explore.
The works on display move between associative memories, events and people that gradually fade from recollection, and memories constructed through continuous exposure to photographs, videos, and representations of the war.
The exhibition examines the tension between tangible objects and disappearing details, testimony and interpretation, and what remains and what dissolves.
The exhibition is curated by Roee Kasher, a documentary photographer, musician, and author. His work focuses, among other subjects, on spaces shaped by war, both military and civilian, and the people who inhabit them. The project will also feature a text written especially for the exhibition by Yaakov Gilad, an Israeli songwriter and lyricist.
For Avital Hefer, Director of Impact Projects at the Reality Group, the space was conceived as a place where complex and painful experiences can be examined and given expression in an environment that encourages listening and dialogue.
She also emphasises that although the events of October 7 and the war have left a profound mark on Israel's collective consciousness, each person has experienced and carries them differently.
This distinction between personal and collective memory is one of the exhibition's central themes.
The exhibition runs until October 22 at 9 Itamar Ben Avi Street, Tel Aviv.
Caroline Haïat
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