Grand Kenyon
August 2018 - October 2019
Dedicated to the life and work of British archaeologist Kathleen M. Kenyon (1906-1978), this duo exhibition
project with artist Ronit Porat (curated by Maayan Sheleff) proposes an additional narrative layer to Kenyon's
multifaceted heritage; an abstract, partly imaginative storyline that evolved from a research into her personal
archive at Baylor University in Texas.
Kenyon, who excavated several biblical sites in the Middle East between 1930-1970, is mostly known for her
excavations in Jericho, and for the extensive stratigraphic research method she has developed over the course
of her career. Inspired by these methods of research and registration, the different artworks project Kenyon’s
techniques on her own “archive.”
Horizons, for instance, are assorted puzzles cut according to skylines from historical photographs of Kenyon’s
excavation sites. Similarly to the “ghost-walls” she discovered by differentiating debris from soil-layers in her
diggings, it is the negative space here that provides meaning and orientation.
Sections is a series of collages that “re-draw” Kenyon’s working-postures, inspired by the drawing techniques used
for her pottery catalogues, while in Editing, photographs that never got into the final versions of her books, are
printed hidden by her own hand-written notes: “2nd choice” or “optional - throw out if necessary.”
:ולקוראי העברית - התכתבות
Photographs by Kira Kletsky