Michal Fuchs is an Israeli visual artist who has lived in Germany since 2010. In 2020, she completed her diploma in metal sculpture at the Burg Giebichenstein University of Art and Design in Halle (Saale).

It is plants that form the starting point for Michal Fuchs’ artistic work. With deliberately chosen distance, the works establish a connection to the artist’s personal diaspora by focusing on the growth process of the living organisms: Seemingly independent of external influences, a change, a constant movement is exerted within. At the same time, iron and concrete are used in such a finely crafted way that they create metaphors on themes such as migration, uprooting and home. The tension between inanimate materials and organic objects becomes the subject of research. Fuchs researches myths and concepts from the Jewish-Israeli world in order to re-locate them – through transformation and reinterpretation – in the same diaspora in Germany. Plants are part of this mythological quest: based on Zionist ideology, the modern Jewish settlement of Palestine went hand in hand with the exploration, representation and use of the local fauna from the very beginning. This was intended to create a sense of connection with the new-old land, building a bridge between pre- and post-diasporic times – literally, Jews were to put down roots in the biblical homeland. These plants, which were also adopted by the Palestinians, are almost always immigrants themselves. / Silvia Gaetti, curator

Translated with DeepL.com