SOMA

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Originally Soma was an abstract visual idea of the artist Ayala Serfaty. It grew and got its shape during a process of many years, which she undertook together with her team. During this process they found different technical directions for the production of the idea. One of them was the thought to use thin, Italian made, glass pipes, which were specially made for her, in several different sizes and color. By heating, they were bended and so became the core framework of Soma. Polymers were brought in, and sprayed over the pipes. The hardening of this material together with the glass pipes gives the Soma frame its topographical image.
Next to her search for materials, Ayala developed a lexicon of patterns of which the strength springs from nature, which can be seen already in her design sketches. She used forms like: membranes, salt crystalline and ice as well as patterns of veins from the body.  More than 20 years of work, Ayala formulated her own unique artistic language. Already at the start of her career, in designing furniture and her first light elements, her works seem as if they came from far underneath the sea level.
In 2007 she was invited by Meira Jagid Haimovitch, curator of Tel Aviv museum of art, to show her work at the museum. The decision to just show Soma there resulted in a very special show. On the floor lies a composition of light elements spread out which gives the impression that it can continue to grow and multiply endlessly. And after the time of withering has been, it could grow all over again.

In the winter of 2008, just a few months ago Jan Teeuwisse and I walked into the space of Soma by accident after leaving a meeting at the Tel Aviv museum. We also were enticed by the magic of it. When leaving Teeuwisse said: this I want also!   From there to now, it was only a question ofproduction.

Sometimes art works can demand more patience of the viewer, or precede reading or analytic tools to be able to understand.  Sometimes it can be frustrating and impossible to understand what you see.
Not with this work of Ayala. Soma is a refined visual experience. There is no need for a former knowledge or analytical tools; there is also no need for any high education or former experience.

When you enter the space of Soma, the eye is taken and you become part of the experience. The work standing in the center of the space leads the eye of the beholder and inviteshim to walk around, to follow the play of light and shadow and to slowly notice the protuberances and the sockets that were created in the material. Youforget the time and the place where you have entered. Only the beauty remains on the eye and in a second you are yourself part of the installation.
For me this is special. This work in a way brings, gave me back in, a trust in beauty. It is a concentrated and pure beauty, A prettiness that does not mean to adorn someone or a place, neither statues or wealthy. This is clean beauty, just for itself.

AyalaSerfaty (b. 1962)lives and works in Tel Aviv, Israel. Shestudied in the Department of Fine Arts, Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem, during the 1980s, and afterwards at Middlesex Polytechnic, London. In 1994, her first solo exhibition was staged at Artifact Gallery, Tel Aviv. Her work has since been exhibited in Israel and the world over.
In 1997 she started participating in the international lighting exhibition Euroluce in Milan. Since then, she has exhibited at the Centre Pompidou (2002), at the Triennale in Milan (2005), at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York (2006) and at the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) in New York (2008).

A lot of thanks are needed and justified for this work to have become real here, people of Beelden aan Zee, the team of Ayala- Aqua creation, and those who supported emotionally and financially. I will not sum up this long list, but thanks to all!  And most of all thanks to Ayala for creating for us this beauty.