Elad Amsalem (1991), painter, Hof HaCarmel.
Graduate of the Department of Multidisciplinary Art, Shenkar.
I paint. In every painting there is at least one figure; it is the beginning of the work, and around it—through it—the painting is built and takes place. Between the figure and the painting itself, in the acts of painting, a tension emerges between concealment and unity, with elements from nature and from the worlds of ritual and tradition. I use tattoo markings on the figure’s body and on the painting itself to connect the figure to color and to the materiality of painting—marks that place the body within the surface and bind it to layers of paint, stain, and erasure.
There is a ritual energy in my paintings, as if from another dimension—a waystation between the material and the spiritual, between the sacred and the profane. The figure is not a private portrait but an open form that allows the viewer to complete what is missing: traces of movement, light and shadow, areas left unresolved alongside precise passages. In this way, the painting functions not as documentation but as an active site where body, nature, and ritual meet—and from within it the figure continues to lead the unfolding.
