Dganit Ben Admon | Up to Here | The Third Dream
Text by Aya Lurie
In memory of the late Mas’uda Maman
The space created by Dganit Ben Admon in her exhibition depicts a state of mind, an existential experience of being under a constant threat of collapse. Exterior and interior are bound together, and mythological memories of her family are interwoven with the present of her life and images of life in the vicinity of her home. The various elements in the installation – including manual, painstaking treatment of ready-made objects (a decorative fountain, construction scaffolding, and an escape ladder), which clearly disrupts and undermines their original function – merge together beliefs, symbols, and nightmares with reality and everyday life. In the middle of the space stands a large wall of scaffolding, whose poles are wrapped in absorbent mattress-protector sheets, clamped together very tightly. Stretched upon this orderly grid of scaffolding, with its criss-cross arrangement of tubes, are transparent PVC tarps with a white grid pattern. These tie in with the pattern of squares set out on the floor with tape – together creating an overall geometric arrangement of a repeating square grid that ostensibly establishes law and order, logic and continuity, and creates a false sense of security in a space of inviolable orderliness.
