To peel layers of glass walls - deciphering a place through layers of knowledge and practice

Introducing a new perspective on the material culture of a place and its impact on individuals, we will surface the diverse voices around Bezalel campus, through various techniques including mapping, documentation, theoretical research, and responsive interventions. The course offers versatile and innovative site-specific insights that interact with spatial, cultural, social & communal narratives.

The Museum of Underground Prisoners is located next to the Bezalel building, as does the detention center and the Russian church, among other buildings and institutions in this dense and charged area, which have all undergone different life cycles. The Museum of Underground Prisoners was constructed at the end of the Ottoman rule as a hostel for Russian pilgrim women and later served as a prison during British rule. In the early 2000s, various art events were held in the museum spaces.

The course will involve extensive and active observation of the material culture of the place alongside focusing on specific details chosen by each student or group of students. Over nine days, we will linger in the area and conduct tours, study, and work in public spaces and specific buildings as sites for mapping and investigating, transitioning to Bezalel and "HaMiff'al" as our artistic-creative work places.

The deep and nuanced observation will employ archaeological-like techniques from various points of view: sensory exploration with cultural and historical perspectives that will form a new non-linear body of knowledge, mapping past and present. combining the physical artistic practice with two-dimensional and three-dimensional techniques, spanning from working with raw materials to 3D printing, sound processing, and experimental techniques and we will  assemble it all into storytelling in the form of an artist book.