Art and design collaborate for nature

ISTANBUL

Arik Levy’s sculptures reflect and reconstruct visuals of our environment in a way neither the eye nor the brain can do. His solo exhibition can be seen at Galerist.

Galerist Art Gallery is hosting Israeli artist Arik levy’s first solo exhibition in Istanbul. As an artist, technician, photographer, designer, and filmmaker, Levy is a multi–disciplinary artist and is best known publicly for his sculptures such as his signature Rock pieces, installations, limited editions and design. He says he nevertheless feels “the world is about people, not objects.”

Hailing originally from Israel and moving to Europe after his first participation in a group sculpture exhibition in Tel Aviv in 1988, Levy currently works in his studio in Paris.

His Istanbul exhibition titled “Activated Nature” is his first solo exhibition in the country. There is a selection of artworks which embody Levy’s work of the last few years, highlighting his prolificacy in a non-stop dialog. His sensitivity to issues that are to do with our everyday life, emotions, patterns and social codes results in a transition to a future-self and man-made nature. Using scientific coding, emotional genetic and “hand on the heart” reactions, Levy says “My work travels in time and space via borderline disorder organization. Through my endless quest for an unavailable formula, I am intending to give via the artworks tools to apply and use daily, addressing personal deflections.”

Nature and human nature

According to Levy, nature and human nature are amazing sources of inspiration. “As I inject my own genes to evolve, contrast, construct and evoke genetic intimacy. Providing a progressive view of my/our world with simple alphabets, the freshly transformed reality is now full of new meanings,” he said.

His sculptures reflect and reconstruct visuals of our environment in a way neither the eye nor the brain can do. That alone is a reflection of a non-existing reality composed of what and where we are. Works are in constant evolution, in continual transformation, showing the layering of the activated mind or nature.

This exhibition lets the artist set up spaces and juxtapose subjects and notions that he works with. ‘’It is not often that I can exhibit in this way, which gives me another space of extra oxygen to see my work blend and become one. I believe the common denominator will be a feeling and a thought rather than a form or a color,” he explained.

After a stint in Japan where he consolidated his ideas producing products and pieces for exhibitions, Levy returned to Europe where he contributed his artistry to another field, contemporary dance and opera by way of set design. Respected for his furniture and light designs, Levy also creates hi–tech clothing lines and accessories in the Far East.

He continues to contribute substantially to visitors’ interior and exterior milieu, his work including public sculpture, as well as complete environments that can be adapted for multiple uses. “Life is a system of signs and symbols,” he says, “where nothing is quite as it seems.”

The exhibition wil continue until Dec. 7.