a The work of Yaara Zach – cocoon-like objects that hang from one of the trees in the garden – is made entirely of synthetic and artificial materials. Nonetheless, it manages to trick the viewers by appearing like real bodies or strange, organic growths. The works are installed in a way that embeds them within the botanical environment. Just as the botanical wonders of the garden invoke a sense of wonderment, so do the objects made by Zach. Visitors are left with no choice but to accept their strange measurements and might be led to believe that her works are bodies or growths that infiltrated the garden from their hiding place, deep within the tropical greenhouse. Zach has been preoccupied in her work throughout the years with the presence of the absent body, and the different layers which potentially allow its existence by supporting it, but also delineating and limiting it. This interest of hers is evident in the transformative objects that are on view in the garden, which quite literally allow one body to disappear so that a new one can emerge from underneath it.

new circular sculpture path opened October 19th at the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens.