Ori Gersht: The Artist Who Subverts the Still Image

Ori Gersht, born in Tel Aviv in 1967 and long based in the UK, uses controlled violence to disrupt the stillness of still-life photography. His work references iconic paintings—Juan Sánchez Cotán's 17th-century 'Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber' (reimagined in 2006's 'Melograno', where a pomegranate becomes a bloody target, echoing the Hebrew word 'rimon' for both fruit and grenade) and Giorgio Morandi's metaphysically serene vases (shattered in the 'New Orders-Evertime 21' series). In the 2021 series 'Becoming, Flower', Gersht photographs Dutch Golden Age flower arrangements, then fragments them spectacularly. 'Becoming, Wall 01 (Metropolitan)' layers postcards from the Met's bookshop on glass, breaks it, and re-photographs the shards. His work was shown at Galleria Bianconi in Milan in 2022, in an exhibition titled 'Revelations in Folds of Time'. Gersht's practice draws on his childhood experience of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, embedding political and human condition into the disruption of visual harmony.