Born in 1974, Beer Sheva, IL
Works and lives between Paris, FR & Tel Aviv, IL
"Claire Luna: Amir, you are Israeli, and live and work between Tel Aviv and Beer Sheva. The first time you exhibited in France was two years ago at the Galleria Continua as part of Sphere 9, and in the FIAC fair with Sommer Contemporary Arts. Today, you are presenting your first solo exhibition To Give What Is Due at In Situ - fabienne leclerc. What reception do you expect from the French public?
Amir Nave: International exposure is a crucial stage in an artist's life and development. It is a phase where a clash between two cultures can reveal a beautiful and fertile bond, and in my exhibition I suggest an additional perspective. It is an invitation to view my reflections and observations about art, coming from a different soil, culture, and life. [...] Paris has inspired me with great thoughts, and a great emotional confrontation. I have only been here for a couple of months, but I feel a deep sadness in the air, the kind of sadness that is associated with romance, solitude and beauty ? a pain that is connected to the history of beauty. Where I come from, the idea of history is entirely different, and so the idea of beauty is too. In Israel I feel no longing. Here, I feel wild. Savage.
CL: Empty spaces occupy a large part of your works. Also, the exterior is minimally represented (or not at all) perhaps with a horizon that is in fact not always horizontal, and more often evoked symbolically than shown. The outside world is contained in the staging of bodies, in their movement and the material of their flesh. How do you conceive of this surrounding emptiness? You've talked extensively about chaos and the abyss: is emptiness or absence a way of evoking them?
AN: In my artistic research destruction tells me more than construction. I'm not afraid when I'm painting. It is something that I can't really explain. It is to be in another dimension. And the struggle within my painting is connected to the relationship between emptiness and the fullness. There are "full" works and "empty" works. This polarization interests me. For me, emptiness can provoke creativity because it is our way of describing something that we cannot fully conceive of. Emptiness is outside the realm of language."
Amir Nave, Three doors, at the edge of the cliff, interview realized by Claire Luna,
January 2018