Spectacular Failure
Spectacular Failure (2025)
CCA, Tel Aviv
Curator: Tamar Margalit
“Spectacular Failure,” CCA Tel Aviv-Yafo’s annual group exhibition, examines the significant role that failure – losing, coming up short – has played in Israeli art over the past fifty years. At a time when we are bombarded with slogans of 'Total Victory’ and ‘Together We Will Win,’ this preoccupation has become especially poignant. The participating artists don’t abandon the playground-like dichotomy of winning and losing, but rather undermine it from within, by identifying with the losing side.spells "SOS".
Text by Tamar Margalit
Installation views by Elad Sarig
Digital print on a puffer jacket, metal clothes rack.
This item of clothing, identified with the security officer, is found in Israel at the entrance to every shopping mall, cinema, school or other large complex. In the work "Promise" it is placed in a slight and ironic disruption: instead of the word "Security" – in Hebrew: AVTAHA – that normally appears on it, the word "Promise" appears – in Herew: HAVTAHA.
Video, mobile phone and charger, variable dimensions
A mobile phone is connected to a charger, that is connected to the wall. The word “Dad” appears on the screen. The phone rings non-stop, shining like a vertical light fixture on the floor of the space, stuck in a loop: an incoming, continuous, never-ending call.