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EFFI & AMIR

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The desert both as a concept and a concrete geographical site plays a crucial role in Israeli
communal identity. Since the famous 40 years of wandering through a desert as a
preparation journey before entering the promised land of milk and honey, the desert
occupies a significant space in Jewish collective memory as a place of transition, both
dangerous and promising, sacred and scary, not compatible for actually living in, and
basically quite an opposite to financially and culturally prosperous life.

When the Zionist movement had put the foundations for the current Israeli state, despite its
rejection of all that is traditionally "Jewish", the desert still symbolized the same romantic
duality of spiritualism and death. A major component of the Zionist project was, and still is,
the battle against the desert. Forestation and implantation projects are part of controlling
the desert, of disarming it from its deadening features.

The video installation "TOPSOIL" starts with the fascination. An empty, virgin landscape of a
warm yellowish white lies at the feet of the viewer. It is seen from a bird eye view, distant,
out of reach, therefore, exotic. There is no activity on the surface, which might interrupt
contemplation, no details which might ruin the ultimate temptation.

The videos, 3 chapters displayed in three different monitors, attempt to fill the gap between
the faraway gaze and the reality. Ironically, the videos show no "real life" footage but were
all shot on the scenery of this artificial polystyrene landscape. The reality they depict is
pure manipulation, an out-of-nothing creation of digital technology, a reality at the edge of
hallucination.

The three videos are made as a loop, in terms of a subtext plot the third chapter end's
brings us back to the first's starting point.

“ Come With Me ” refers to the optical illusion common in deserts - the mirage, in this chapter
the view is still dominated by the distant and the indirect encounter.

“ We Are Busy Creating A Desert, Which We Can Then Call Peace ” describes the incident of
shooting down a Libyan civilian aircraft that mistakenly strayed over the Sinai desert in 1973.
This chapter confronts the reality of the desert and its possible consequences.

“ A Report Of An Affected Country ” is a scientific analysis of a state fighting the desertification
of its landscape, a barren effort, which encourages exactly what it aims to negate.

reading:

Come with me- Chloe Morrison (E), Ilanit Ben Ya'akov (H)
Busy creating a Deseet- Max Sackstein (E) Yinon Magal (H)
A report of an affected country- Avigail Krispin (E), Ilanit Ben Ya'akov (H)

we'd also like to thank:
Guy Bahir, Brian McKenna, Paul Cosier and Paul Goodman

All the voice over text is based on real sources, the main are:

Morgan Le Fay - a poem by Madison Cawein, (1865-1914)
The memorial website of flight 114
NASA
Ben-Gurion University , The desert institute,
UNCCD reports
islandnet.com -weather phenomenon and elements