The exhibition explores the deconstruction of the Israeli identity in response to recent social and political crises, building up to the events of October 7, 2023.
Traditionally, jewelry serves as a means of personal expression, a bearer of memory, a status symbol, a political marker, or a sign of bravery. However, in an era lacking consensus, it takes on new roles. Through deconstruction, fragmentation, and reassembly of familiar national and military symbols and insignia, the jewelry and objects presented in the exhibition raise questions about belonging, collective memory, and the shaken Israeli ethos.
National icons such as David Ben-Gurion, the Menorah, the Knesset building, military ranks, and more, undergo form and material distortion, acquiring new ironic and conceptual meanings.
The exhibition features a new body of work responding to contemporary events alongside previous works reflecting societal changes in Israel in recent years. Aligned with Israel’s Memorial Day and the country’s 77th Independence Day, the exhibition echoes the transition from mourning to joy and from remembrance to rebirth.
As a contemporary jeweler and an architectural curator, Golan and Yosifon-Goldman draw a tense line between personal, private jewelry and the public, national, and institutional space. In a time of crisis in trust and faith, the exhibition—its works and the spatial experience—also offers hope for healing and hard to believe unity.