Chani Cohen Zada

Artist statement

My name is Chani Cohen Zada. I am a painter and artist, living and working in Talmon. I have held nine solo exhibitions in galleries and museums, including in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, and have participated in many group exhibitions. In the Hebrew year 5780 (2019–2020), I received the Minister of Education’s Uri Orbach Award for Creators in Jewish Culture in the field of visual art.

A significant turning point in my life was studying Cognitive Development, known as the Yemima Method. This study gave me tools for awareness that improved my life and also helped me acquire the craft of painting. I explore these tools through the motifs I choose to paint.

I seek to offer the Jewish people art that strengthens and inspires faith, conveying joy and pride in Jewish tradition, the Jewish people, and the State of Israel.

My work draws inspiration from the Bible and Hasidic writings, as well as from the Yemima Method, which I studied and now teach myself.

My painting is figurative: I create the illusion of a tangible reality through patches of colour. This approach speaks to me because it echoes my search for the spirituality concealed within the material world.

I work mainly in oils on wood panels or canvas, in medium to large formats.

I stage narrative scenes using still-life arrangements or figures, and paint from direct observation, sometimes adding elements from my imagination. The scenes I stage represent, for me, exemplary figures from the Bible or ideas drawn from Cognitive Development or Kabbalah. I express spiritual forces through personal symbols from my own life.

My search for spiritual reality finds expression both in the narratives of my paintings and in the craft of painting itself.

I love the way the craft of painting reflects the craft of living. Good painting creates harmony among the thousands of small elements that compose it. Just as a painting is a delicate, precise weave of thousands of patches of colour, we aspire to bring the complexity of our lives—our relationships with others and with ourselves—closer to such a delicate and precise weave.

I find many points of connection between studying the Yemima Method—developing awareness and the capacity for discernment—and the craft of painting.

Through the Yemima Method, I learn tools that closely resemble those I use in painting. For example:

• Listening and recognising what is present, just as it is.
• Taking enough distance to see the larger picture.
• Developing in stages, one part building on another.
• Seeing each part within its context.

I have always felt that art and Judaism meet because both engage with the soul. Judaism builds the soul, while art expresses its inner dialogue.

My aspiration is to create Jewish art that nurtures the building of the soul and touches its infinite depths.